nothing but my aching soul
by leighismyname
Summary: the one where Percy is an Olympic swimmer with a tattoo on his wrist and skeletons in his closet and Annabeth is a famous author who has a complicated life and the same tattoo - soulmate au.
1. Chapter 1

Chapter One:

" _What we find in a soulmate is not something wild to tame, but something wild to run with."_

 _-Robert Brault_

* * *

"She is going to hate you forever, you know that, right?" Nico says, crossing his arms and leaning back against the wall.

Percy narrows his eyes at Nico. "It's not for _her_." He says, "it's for my mom."

Jason loudly sinks his teeth into his apple and Percy looks over at him. "Percy," the blond one says with too much apple in his mouth and frankly, Percy feels _offended._ "We already know that. But, you still haven't told us what you're getting."

Percy cringes at his cousin. "Jason, chew, swallow, then talk. Please."

Nico turns to Percy, an eyebrow raised. "What _are_ you getting, Percy? Because I have a lot of other places I could be, other people to meet-"

Jason snorts. "Nico, you have no other friends."

Nico uncrosses then re-crosses his legs to show his gradually increasing irritation.

Percy looks down at his bare arm, knowing it won't look like that in less than an hour. Maybe, though, if the tattoo guy could just hurry up. Percy already has enough nerves as it is. "I'm getting it on my arm."

Jason rolls his eyes and kindly swallows his apple portion. "We kinda guessed that when you asked us to help you shave your arm yesterday."

"I'm a swimmer, Jason, shaving my entire body is apart of the gig."

Nico scoffs. "It saves you, what?, milliseconds in a race? And it leaves you looking like a Ken doll."

"Remember, Nico," Percy says, "milliseconds is what got me my job. And if I have to shave my entire body and look like a Ken doll and keep my job, I'll shave my entire body. Hell, I might even wax."

Jason throws his apple core into the trash, barely making it in. He says, "Stop changing the subject, Michael Phelps, what are you getting permanently inked on your skin?"

Percy's eyes widen. "Well, when you put it that way, it sounds terrifying."

Nico glares at him and _that's_ when the tattoo guy decides it is a good time to walk into the room.  
The tattoo parlour itself is very … contrasting… to say the least. The front wall is all windows, but long, floor to ceiling, velvety red curtains drape over them, making the entire room dark and eerie. This is the place you go to get murdered, not to get a tattoo. But every inch of the black painted walls is covered in sample tattoos, from butterflies to lions that go from your waist to your forehead. It's set up like a hair salon, where the chairs are near the back, except there are no mirrors and no nice ladies here to chat about the latest gossip on the street.

There is Garth, though. Garth is the tattoo guy. He also does piercings, just in case you were interested. Thankfully, he doesn't watch the summer Olympics because he didn't recognize Percy at all. Garth must think he's just another nineteen year old dweeb coming to ruin any chance of getting a job by getting a tattoo.

Well, jokes on him. Percy's twenty.

Garth is a big guy. He has inked sleeves running up and down each arm, filled with pictures of manly things like wrenches or cupcakes. Percy doesn't really understand the latter. Garth has this really big beard and wears sunglasses inside (?); he has a leather jacket and basically looks like your average biker-slash-tattoo guy.

Percy especially found it interesting when Garth wouldn't stop going on about how his cabbages were doing when he walked into the parlour.

Garth grunts, bringing Percy back to reality. "So, kid, whaddya want?"

Percy glances at his friends and smiles. "The letter 'S' on the inside of my left wrist, please." Nico and Jason smile at him sadly while Garth simply grunts (he seems to do that a lot).

Not that sympathy or whatever isn't a good thing, but Percy hates the pity. His mother, and the most wonderful woman on the planet, was diagnosed with cancer when she was thirty-seven, which was three years ago, she is now forty and it's terminal. She has months.

The doctor said she wouldn't make it to her next birthday.

When Percy came home from school three years ago, on October twenty-ninth, and found his mom lying on the floor, passed out cold and barely breathing, he was just a senior. Only seventeen and she was just thirty-seven. Both too young for something like that.

This was the time where Percy drowned himself in other activities, trying to distract his mind from such things like hospital checkups he couldn't afford and the fact that his mom was _dying_ and he couldn't do anything about it. He started swimming. Well, he had always swam, he was on the school's team, but it was like every waking moment he wasn't sleeping, or eating, or in class, he was in the water.

He pretty much became, like, the bestest swimmer ever.

At least, that was what his _fans_ said.

When Percy was at his last swim meet of the year, an olympic scouter showed up and watched as Percy creamed the other guys. He was pretty much set from there.

Being an Olympic swimmer had its perks. All Percy had to do was swim and make sure he won, so he could bring money home for his dying mother. Though, no matter how many meets Percy came in first place, or how many interviews he did, no matter how much money Percy made, his mother couldn't be cured.

Of course, Sally, Percy's mom, never shows her fear about having cancer; she never lets Percy know she' scared. She never shows him her vulnerable side.

Percy's always thankful for that. He thinks that seeing his mom cry would break him in ways he never thought possible.

But, in a way, he wants her to sit him down and cry with him. He wants her to break down into tears as they make cookies together, telling him through choked sobs that this might be the last time they do so; he wants her to make it real. He wants her to show that she is afraid because that is normal.

Percy just wants as much normal as he can get. He wants her to prove that he isn't crazy, that waking up in a cold sweat with a nightmare flashing over his eyelids isn't overreacting, that frequent panic attacks is not blowing things out of proportion.

But, still, seeing his mother on the floor, eyes wide and blank, her chest rising and falling so subtly, is something Percy will never forget. He thinks that red eyed, tear stained cheeks, and loud sobbing coming from his mother is another thing he would never forget and never wants to see.

So, that's why he's getting his tattoo. (The letter 'S' for Sally on his wrist so he'll always be able to see it.)

For his mom and only for her.

Not to get attention from his soulmate who seems a little too stuck up anyway.

* * *

 **hello there how are you**

 **wooooOw it's been a while hasn't it?**

 **today is my one year anniversary of being in this fandom how exciting!**

 **so yes, my friends, this is a multi chapter fic. I have been working on this since January and wow. I haven't even finished it yet, but who cares, i'm feeling impulsive and uploading it anyway.**

 **I know this is short, but in the fashion of Real BooksTM I decided to have some chapters be incredibly short due to Dramatic Cliff Hangers. how great.**

 **yes! this is a soulmate fic thanks for asking!11! and yes!1!1 it is percabeth, no worries, we meet beautiful bethy next chapter.**

 **I hope you all have your backpacks filled with supplies because this will be one bumpy emotional ride.**

 **I'm so glad to be back! I've missed uploading so this is EXCITING!**

 **I'll be uploading every Friday, save for one (1) exception because i'll be out of town with no internet, but I'll warn you when that gets near.**

 **anyway**

 **please review! i've been so excited about uploading this story and i know this is short but feedback would be greatly appreciated!**

 **I'll see you all next friday! byyyyyyyyeee**

 **\- leigh**


	2. Chapter 2

_Chapter Two_

" _Your soulmate is not someone who comes into your life peacefully."_

 _-Unknown_

* * *

Annabeth wakes up with a throbbing arm.

It isn't the whole arm, okay, it's just the wrist but it's still throbbing and it still doesn't feel all too well.

Actually, the arm isn't the reason she wakes up, it's Piper kneeing her back, and the fact that she's having the worst dream that she flew to England and she was so excited but then this nut, a nut who looked alarmingly a lot like Leo Valdez, opened the plane door and everyone died, so she couldn't get to England.

Then the arm.

She sits up groaning. "Piper, god, you have your own bed, why don't you ever _use it_?"

Piper simply hums and snuggles her face into the pillow a bit more, a content smile on her face. "Your bed is softer."

"Ryan Gosling's bed is probably really nice also, but that doesn't mean I'm going to sleep in it."

Ryan lives upstairs, almost directly above them. No joke. He isn't there very often, more like at all, but the girls use the fact that they live an elevator ride away from Ryan Gosling to their utmost advantage. No one ever believes it, of course.

Piper opens her eyes just to roll them at Annabeth, then flutters them shut, keeping her stupid smile on her face.

Annabeth has always liked Piper's eyes. Not because they were the most beautiful 'ever-changing' eyes you have ever seen (at least, that's how the Wal-Mart worker called it), but because that was only one eye. The other one was bright, pale blue. It's the colour of the sky and Piper hates it; she would never let Annabeth forget that, too.

Piper resents the idea of soulmates.

Okay, background is probably necessary.

Soulmates are a thing.

Not love-at-first-sight-soulmates. No, no, actual soulmates. People you are physically and psychologically bounded to, in a figurative sense.

Annabeth has never really fancied the idea of having a soulmate. Of having some higher, unknown, and unknowable force choose who you are going to be with your entire life. She thinks that soulmates are impractical and quite frankly, overrated.

Back in the ninetys when the whole soulmate thing started, people were going crazy trying to find them. There was a dramatic increase in the amount of divorces across the country, many people ending their relationship to go search for their soulmate. Annabeth didn't like it at all.

Neither did scientists.

They couldn't figure out a pattern. Why did all these people get to have their soulmates name etched on their heart from the moment they were born, but these guys only have a strip of their hair matching the one of their soulmates? There just wasn't any reliable reasoning for any bit of why this whole 'meant-to-be' business made sense. No background, no 'first', no logical explanation, and the fact that Annabeth herself couldn't put into words how soulmates worked bugged her to no extent.

But that's just her author instincts showing through.

Fun Fact: Soulmates, or as some called it, Meant To Be's, are a phenomenon that started too long ago to remember, and no one ever really questioned it. Scientists tried to figure out how it works, but eventually gave way. In the words of one smirking Michael Scott, it's too hard. Years of work go into one simple, yet completely complicated, mechanism that now everyone has experience with, and so far, they haven't gotten an inch closer to figuring anything out.

Funner Fact: the whole 'who's your soulmate' deal is different for everyone. Some people get the easy way, a name, tattooed over their heart when they turn eighteen that just shows up when you blow out your candles or something. Others get slightly harder ways of finding them, like their soulmates first words said to them written on their wrists, maybe a symbol that represents them on their body somewhere.

Soulmates weren't just figured out because of a name, sometimes, like Piper, when you turn ten, one of your eyes changes to match the one of your soulmates, and vice versa.

Some people aren't as lucky, though.

There have been blogs about kids living their whole lives seeing black and white, in a constant state of irreversible pain, or always feeling cold like no one's ever felt before, until they meet their soulmate. Some people never meet their soulmate and spend their entire life in the cold, the pain, the grey.

Annabeth, though, thinks that she has the worst of them all.

Any sort of cut, scratch, mark, ink, or bruise on her arm, will appear on _his_ arm and vice versa. But, of course, it doesn't stop there. Because it's not just the arm. It's the entire body. Sure, if her soulmate gets a huge gash on his forehead, she will too, and they'll both having matching scars. (And she sincerely hopes he doesn't get a huge gash in his forehead anytime soon.)

Which is why she doesn't understand why her wrist hurts in _one specific_ spot.

Though she knows Piper isn't listening, Annabeth says anyway, "I'm going to the bathroom."

Lazily, she throws her legs over the side of the bed, thanking God for carpet, because she doesn't think she can handle cold tile floors right now, and walks to the bathroom. Once in, she shuts the door and stares at herself in the mirror.

Dark bags under her eyes, crappy looking, frizzy hair, two-day-old clothes, and chipped nails like no other. Just another struggling author.

Not so much struggling, Annabeth does have a New York Best Seller, but struggling in the sense that she is _struggling_ to come up with an adequate idea and write another book. Writer's block seriously is a bitch.

She sighs and turns the water on, waiting for it to become hot. Being brought from her mind, she realizes that her wrist is still throbbing. She looks down at her upturned wrist and what she sees is obviously not what she expects.

S

Just that. Just an 's' on her wrist. In dark, black ink, too, lined with an irritated red shade of skin. For a second, she contemplates the thought that she and Piper may have gone out last night, drank too much and she got a tattoo, then she remembers that she stayed up until two a.m. trying to come up with a story prompt. So, no, this was not her doing.

So it must've been her soulmate. But why would he write just the letter 's' on his wrist, knowing it would show up on hers?

Annabeth sighs and opens the cupboard below the sink to find a hand cloth. She runs the material under the warm water and rings it out. Slowly, she rubs her wrist, wincing at the rough towel; it doesn't come off. She doesn't fret, some markers are a little more durable than others. She puts some more water on the towel, rings it, then adds a little bit of her hand soap, hoping the suds will help evade the ink. Still a bit sleepy, she yawns and shifts her weight onto her other leg. Impatiently, she takes off the towel to examine exactly how permanent this permanent marker is; it doesn't come off. Like, at all. It doesn't even fade.

Just as black as before, but a little more irritated from the rubbing, the letter 's' stares at her, as if taunting her, sticking its tongue out and tripping her to the floor.

Her sneaky little soulmate got a tattoo.

Annabeth's eyes widen, she falters, not knowing what to do at this point. She doesn't want to give _him_ the satisfaction of seeing her anger about the tattoo, so she calmly shuts off the water and leaves the bathroom, going to sit on the bed next to Piper, who's scrolling through her phone.

"Piper," Annabeth says, "he got a tattoo."

Piper frowns. "Who got a tattoo- Oh my god, did he really? That jerk!" she says. "Let me see it."

Annabeth rolls her eyes, then turns her wrist out, showing off the irritated 's'. Piper gasps.

"Not that this isn't so totally badass, but it's also really mysterious," Piper says, "I wonder what the 'S' stands for. Maybe it's a girlfriend."

Annabeth snorted. "My soulmate got a tattoo of his girlfriends name on his wrist where he knows I would see it? Sounds very unlikely. Maybe it's a dead relative," she muses.

Piper drops her hand and nods. "Could be."

Annabeth sighs, deciding that she'll have to deal with this problem later. "I have work all day today, so you're in charge of dinner tonight."

Piper pouts. "But I'm in charge of dinner every night."

Annabeth rolls her eyes at her friends over dramaticness. "Yes, but you get out of class at four, I get off of work at eight, it's only fair."

Piper frowns before straightening, an uncomfortably mischievous twinkle in them. "I'll get dinner, but you have to clean the apartment this weekend."

Annabeth thinks about it. Either getting food for both her and Piper after a full day of work, and getting home at nine to eat it (granted, it probably will be take-away) or doing dishes and mopping floors on her free time. For a second, she almost takes away her deal and says that she'll just get dinner, but then she remembers that if she isn't preoccupied all weekend, she'll have to work on her new book and that is something she is really trying to procrastinate. "Fine, whatever, I'll clean the apartment."

Piper cheers and kisses Annabeth's cheek. Annabeth can't stay irritated with her friend, it's hard to be angry at someone with so much enthusiasm she simply oozes energy like the opposite of a black hole. Is there something the opposite of a black hole?

(After doing some research, Annabeth figures out that there is such thing as a white hole, which doesn't allow anything to come in from the outside, but light and matter can escape from it, while a black hole sucks up everything around it and no light nor matter can escape.

So there, Piper's a white hole.

That's what she said.)

Anyway.

Annabeth and Piper have been best friends since second grade. Before that, Annabeth didn't have many friends. Actually, she didn't have any friends.

She didn't understand why, though; she went to school, did her work, played tag at recess, ate lunch with all the other girls in her class, and walked to her dad's car once class ended. She didn't really understand that she'd have to talk to people in order to make friends, that was the only problem.

In second grade, Piper was the new girl, coming in with her horribly cut hair and bubbly attitude. Piper saw the lonely girl who read books underneath a shaded tree during recess and ate alone and in silence at lunch and immediately decided that Annabeth would be her new best friend. Piper never stopped being the best friend, even when the big 'we don't talk about that' thing happened. Not even then.

See, at the time Annabeth only had Piper, and she didn't really know how to act around other people, Annabeth just assumed they were all nice and overly energized and friendly.

So when Travis Stoll helped her up off the ground in fourth grade with a broken heart and a scraped knee, she didn't realize that it was the wrong time to kiss him straight on the mouth, but she did it anyway. The other kids made fun of her, but Travis thought she was neat, he became her other best friend, "As long as you don't kiss me again; dad says I'm not aloud to break hearts yet," he said to her that same day at lunch.

Once high school came around, Annabeth and Travis had dated, it was a beautiful and sweet and very serious relationship, until graduation, of course, when they broke it off. Travis was going to school in England, of all places, and Annabeth went to New York with her best friend. The break up was heart wrenching. It hurt Annabeth and set her off course for a while; she was losing her best friend and boyfriend. She knew it wouldn't work though; when the seniors had their annual 'end of school beach party' and Travis took off his shirt, she caught glimpse of it.

 _Katie Gardener_

It was printed right over his heart, in black, permanent ink.

Whoever she is, Annabeth thinks, she is lucky, Travis is an outstanding guy.

"Annabeth, can you pass the coffee?" Piper says, about ten minutes after their conversation in the bedroom.

Annabeth feverishly passes the kettle and whips around the room, throwing on her shoes and grabbing her backpack, phone, keys, pouring her steamy coffee in a to-go cup and finally taking a moment to brush her teeth and throw her hair in possibly the messiest ponytail she has ever managed to sit on top of her head, and that is saying something.

"Bye, Piper. Love you," she calls as she races out of the apartment, not even bothering to close the door as she speed walks to the elevators. She takes a deep breath and hits the down button, trying to calm her heart rate.

She only has twenty minutes to get to the library and it's a thirty minutes drive.

The doors open and Annabeth groans internally as she sees that there's already someone in the elevator. She smiles to the strangely familiar boy who wears _swim trunks_ even though it's is quite a fine-looking dude. Black hair and green eyes. She thinks that if only he had the scar and the glasses, this fellow could be a grown up Harry Potter.

Then it hits her.

He's Jackson. Percy Jackson, the hot famous swimmer. He won the Olympics a million times, apparently he's also the best swimmer of his generation, too, because he was picked right out of high school and into the big leagues. Annabeth remembers watching a video of him that Piper showed her. He had a beautiful body. Like, stunningly beautiful. The two girls gushed over him like mad for almost twenty minutes when the conversation was suddenly shifted to Mac and Cheese. (Annabeth thought homemade, Piper said Kraft, they didn't talk for a few hours.)

The elevator comes to a stop at the lobby floor and the two of them walk out, Percy to the indoor swimming pool, and Annabeth to the front doors. She almost snorts, of course the swimmer guy would go swimming on his free time.

Waiting for a taxi, she pulls out her phone and texts Piper.

Annabeth: _guess who lives in our building?_

Piper: _annieeeee you know i chat with ryan everynight over wine and cheese, this is no news to me_

Annabeth: _percy jackson, the gorgeously famous swimmer guy_

Piper: _i wish you were here i just fell out of my chair._

Piper: _are you serious tho? Are you sure it was him, cause if it wasn't im gunna whip you._

A taxi pulls up as Annabeth waves for it and she gets inside, quickly telling the driver the location and going back to her phone.

Annabeth: _he was wearing swim trunks and going to the pool. I think its him_

Piper: _yah but did he have a shirt on?_

Annabeth: _o my god yes of course he had a shirt on piper, he isn't a caveman_

Piper: _how much hotter is he in person_

Annabeth: _i was drooling all over the floor pipes_

Piper: _that sounded sarcastic_

Piper: _did he have the tattoo?_

Annabeth: _what_

Piper: _the 's' you have on your wrist, did you check if he had it too? Maybe he's your soulmate annie, and you didn't even check_

Annabeth rolls her eyes.

Annabeth: _of course i didn't check, plus he was wearing this weird long sleeve swim shirt thing._

Piper: _disappointing_

Annabeth smiles and tucks her phone away in her pocket, deciding to stare at the tall buildings and loud, bustling streets of New York as she passes them by.

She sighs and leans back against the seat, letting herself sink into the old leather.

* * *

 **hello there how are you guys!**

 **it's literally midnight so technically its midnight which means it's friday so new chapter! i've been way too excited to update so here's chapter two!**

 **don't we just love annabeth and piper's friendship so much? they are my two favorite people to exist so obviously they're friendship is gonna be epic in this story! get excited!**

 **i know i am**

 **im so tired you have no idea**

 **okay, so important info**

 **im going on a road trip on saturday and i wont be back until friday, so i won't be uploading next friday, but next next friday i will be back!**

 **i'll be responding to pms, so don't hold back on those! (*wink wink IAmHelenofTroy that means we can still fangirl over everything together still)**

 **alrighty then i should sleep cause i have a lot of things to do tomorrow (today?) so i hope you're all having a good day!**

 **\- leigh**


	3. Chapter 3

_Chapter Three_

" _The world was not designed to stop you from doing stupid things, because that would also stop you from doing clever things."_

 _-Doug Gwyn_

* * *

Percy is starting to think that he has a knack for doing stupid things.

Example 1, he wakes up and decides to go swimming. It's January, who does that. Percy, apparently.

Example C, he didn't say at least hello to the cute girl in the elevator? He'll probably never see her again.

Example VIII, he went to the apartment complex's swimming pool instead of the perfectly awesome Olympic training pools that are almost always available to him.

It isn't like he wanted those girls to freak out over him, he didn't even notice them in the beginning. At first, it was just him and the chlorine that was destined to get into his eyes. And then, it was him and four teenage girls, probably high schoolers, ogling him like mad eagles, stalking its prey. And the chlorine in his eyes.

He just gets out of the pool and there they are, eyes wide, mouths agape. One of them is actually looking in his eyes, the others' stares travel a little lower, the girl on the far left presses a button on her phone and the flash goes off, blinding Percy. He smiles hesitantly to them, hoping they'll just let him go without having to run. "Hello?" he says weakly.

One of the girls grins, showing off her green braces. "Hi!" she chirps, "we're such big fans of you, and were wondering if we could maybe get a picture?"

He doesn't want to turn them down, because, come on, that's freaking rude, but he doesn't want to take a picture. See his dilemma?

Don't get him wrong, Percy loves meeting his fans, but, well, he's just wearing swim trunks and nothing else, his towel is sitting on a diving block just behind the four girls, plus, Percy didn't come down to the pool to train and meet some fourteen year olds, he wanted to clear his head.

His mom is currently at another doctors appointment, this one is finalizing that, no, she will not be doing chemotherapy, because she would rather die sooner, and not in terrible pain, than later in terrible pain. Percy had a row with her the other night about it, which is why he needs to clear his head.

It's not like he wanted to argue with her about it, it's just that he loves his mom so much, he can't help but be a little selfish and want her on this Earth longer, is that so wrong? But Sally insisted on saying no to chemo, she was stubborn about it and Percy almost broke. Instead he just drove to his apartment and took the little key under the doormat (because that's the safest place to hide a key, in the one spot every burglar would look ever) and let himself inside, crashing in his bed and letting the most mind numbing sleep take him over.

Then in the morning, he put on his trunks and went to the pool.

Percy runs a hand through his wet hair, hoping to stop it from dripping into his eye sockets. "Uh, sorry, I'm actually runnin-"

"Is that a tattoo?" The tallest girl, who has a few good inches on Percy, said, staring and pointing to his hand that is still in his hair.

Percy moves his hand to look at it, the small 'S' that is redder than it was last night. Percy almost smirks. So she's seen it.

He's always had this personal _vendetta_ against his soulmate.

He's never met her, in fact, he doesn't even know her name, but once in seventh grade he ran out of scrap paper to work out his maths answers on during a test. So, like any clear-thinking twelve year old would do, he wrote on his arm. It was long division and it took him a second to figure out what 247 minus 89 equaled, but as soon as he did figure it out, the answer was already on his arm, but in different handwriting. Neater, too.

He was _mesmerized_. And from that moment, he always asked her for answers because, hey, you can't call me out for cheating if I'm just writing on my arm?, and it was so cool, to be able to talk to your soulmate in that way. He didn't just talk maths, though. They discussed best pizza toppings, what to do when the teacher catches you chewing gum, _hey how's your day I'm stuck in detention_ , how to deal with moving on to high school, and their favourite game, twenty questions. Only rule was: no names.

He practically fell in love with her.

Until she flat out ignored him when high school started.

He talked to her that summer, _hey whats up I just bought a blue notebook with matching pens, hows your day_ , but then he's in first period, his first high school class. He's pretty sure the teacher sleeps at the school and also there's a senior sitting in front of him and he's _terrified_ , so naturally, he confides his soulmate, who doesn't respond. He thinks, whatever, she's probably too busy being smart to pay any attention to me, that's cool. But then it's been two months and suddenly he just gives up.

She hasn't responded since.

Though there were a few times he'd get notes scrawled on his arm. Things like _milk, butter, and no eggs bc pipes is on a diet and is annoying_ , or _protagonist: blonde w blue eyes or brunette w no eyes?_ , he decided that she was probably a writer, at least he hoped, because he didn't really want to know who would name their child Pipes and why they're on a diet. Every time there is a note, though, by the end of the day, she's already crossed it out or run it over with black marker, as if she's hoping he didn't read it.

At least he knows she's not dead.

"What does the 's' stand for?" The braces girl asks again, bringing him from his thoughts.

He panics for some reason because his worst fear is people finding out about his mom. He doesn't want sympathy, or attention, he just wants his freaking mom. "Uh, it's, um, a secret? Also, apologies, I have to go." He walks around them and grabs his towel, practically speeds out of the pool room.

Before the door shuts all the way, though, he hears "you think he has a secret girlfriend or something?", and he suddenly realizes how screwed he is.

* * *

Percy makes it to his flat in seconds, though he did have to stand, dripping, in the elevator. The girl with the different eyes and choppy hair doesn't seem to mind, though, she's just texting on her phone with almost lightening speed. He's tapping his foot excessively and is pretty sure he's splashing water all over her, he feels bad; she's only wearing socks.

As soon as the lift doors open, he runs down the hallway and opens the door to his shared apartment with his cousins, Nico and Jason, because he knows they never lock it. (One of these days they will get robbed and Percy will _laugh_ )

Quickly, he takes Jason's phone from the counter, though he doesn't know where Jason is, and calls his mom.

It rings for seven and a half seconds.

"Mom?"

"Percy, sweetie, how are you?" Her soft voice aches his heart.

"I'm fine, mom, how did the appointment go?"

She chuckles at his bluntness. "It went."

He loves her so much.

"But really, Percy, I told the doctor I'm not doing chemo, and he said that's fine, but I-" her voice breaks and so does Percy's heart "-lets meet for lunch and I'll tell you the details."

That means 'what I need to tell you is too heartbreaking to tell you over the phone, let's eat lunch and cry together', essentially.

He agrees anyway. "Of course, mom, how about Sally's?"

She chuckles because having a restaurant with her same name is amusing to her.

Percy loves her _so much_.

"Okay, sweetheart, is one o'clock okay?"

"It's perfect."

"I love you."

"I love you too, mom." so much.

* * *

Annabeth gets a text during her lunch break.

Many of them, actually.

The only person who ever really texts her, though, is Piper, so what do you expect?

Piper: _you weren't lying omgod i thought you were lying_

Piper _: i'm in the lift with him, annie_

Annabeth assumes she means Percy Jackson.

Piper: _hes wearing swim trunks, annabeth, hes literally dripping wet_

Piper: _annie hes dripping on me_

Piper: _my calves are soaking_

Piper: _remind me to wear shoes when i get the mail next time this is torture_

Piper: _bu you weren't kiddin hes freaking attractive_

Piper: _too bad he has matching eyes, they're green btw,_

Piper _: we would've made such a cute couple_

Piper: _aniiiiiiiiiieeee you won't believe it he liVES ON OUR FLOOR_

Piper: _im going to pass out_

Piper: _he lives with that emo kid down the hall_

Piper: _the one that plays that card game by himself in the hallway_

Piper: _the one who hides his key under the doormat_

Piper: _annie they're roommates i'm sure of it_

Piper: _plot twist if they were gay tho._

Piper: _okay ryan gosling and now this?_

Piper: _were going to get second hand famous by hanging out with all these famous people_

Piper: _next thing you know, mrs dodds is actually beyonce_

Piper: _her cat is jayz_

Piper: _annabeth he has a cute butt hes perfect for you_

She texts back because she's afraid her overflowing inbox may crash her phone.

Annabeth: _told you_

Annabeth: _also you need to start texting in paragraphs like a normal human_

Annabeth: _and go to class_

Annabeth: _also wear shoes when you get the mail: reminder #1_

Annabeth: _i may be hypocritical; paragraphs are for losers_

* * *

 **hello there everyone how is your week going?**

 **so yesterday was my birthday! i got a really nice camera and it takes such beautiful pictures its amazing i love it.**

 **hold your horses there, i wasn't going to upload today but we got back from our trip early so i can upload!**

 **this chapter does have a bit of both worlds. percy and annabeth! and oh! wow! look at that! in the elevator!**

 **tbh when i wrote this chapter i forgot about it and when i went back to edit it i was laughing so hard. i love piper so much its insane.**

 **shes epic in this story so hold on.**

 **also (if anyone cares lol) my vacation was so fun! my family and i went white water rafting in the colorado river! which was a lot more calm than it sounds, especially because its now august. but the weather was so warm and sunny and now im back in london and it's all stormy and humid and rainy. i wanna go back!**

 **anyway**

 **i hope you enjoyed this chapter, no worries, the chapters do get longer, but then again i do have a chapter coming up that's only a couple hundred words so sorry, but sometimes things just seem to go by so fast if you don't split them into different chapters. also it emphasizes the dramatics and feelings if you do it separately.**

 **also one more little thing and then im gone.**

 **right now i am absolutely obsessed! with dear evan hansen, i know every word to all the songs and words fail always makes me cry, also requiem is my FAVORITE. zoe murphys solo part where the music is kind of soft, but her voice is loud and angry and intense just AHHHHHHHHH i want to scream the words from the top of a mountain. waving through a window is my personal anthem. catch me singing all three parts at once during sincerely me. ALSO GOOD FOR YOU IS SUCH A GREAT F* YOU KIND OF SONG. MISS HANSEN IS SUCH A BADASS AND UGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH.**

 **that was excessive im sorry, but i just had to let that out.**

 **don't forget to leave a review, i love positive feedback and constructive criticism. (also yes this is prewritten so chances are if you ask me to write something one way it probably won't happen bc i already wrote the story? if that makes sense)**

 **also pm me if you love dear evan hansen as much as i do bc we can cry and talk about it, i would absolutely love that.**

 **okay now im gone.**

 **\- leigh**


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four

"Don't worry.. 'bout a thing … cause every little thing... is gonna be alright….."

-Bob Marley, Three Little Birds

(line break)

Percy's knee bounces up and down as he waits for his mom at the cafe.

He kinda knows what she's going to say, but he doesn't want to admit it, she's his mom, she can do anything.

Even beat terminal cancer.

He checks his watch again, like he has been doing every forty-five seconds, and just like last time, it's only forty-five seconds later.

Percy ordered a water because he thought that he might as well get something so he doesn't look as anxious as he feels. But the water sits untouched and the little ring of condensation just goes as proof. (Also, something he never thought was possible, the water just tastes bad. Is it possible for the water to become expired? Because he thinks it tastes like it's been sitting in a warehouse for eighty years.)

He waits for a full twenty minutes, and nothing remotely interesting happens. (Okay, so the cute blonde from the elevator showed up and ordered two black coffees and proceeded to put four spoons of sugar in one and then down the other in seconds; that was pretty impressive, but Percy doesn't grieve). And finally, at one, on the dot, Sally arrives with a smile that doesn't meet her eyes. Percy stands up and hugs her tightly, not caring about the odd looks he receives.

Fidgetly, Percy sits down and Sally does the same. He doesn't dawdle. "What did the doctor say, mom?"

Sally pretends as if she didn't hear him. Instead, she talks softly and picks up his water, putting it on a napkin and uses another to wipe the ring off the table. "How was your day, sweetie? I must say, mine was quite good. I just saw the chubbiest bird try to fly out of its nest, eventually he gave up and just waddled around the park, picking up leftover food from this sweet boy's birthday party. You know, Percy, I tell you, Transformers is coming back. That little boy, Devin, I think his name was, just absolutely loved his cake. See it had -"

"Mom." Percy says, interrupting her. "I love you, but please, just tell me." His voice is pleading.

Percy really doesn't want to hear the words about to come from his mother's mouth, but he can't pretend as if it's not happening. He needs to face it head on, or someday in the future, he's going to get bitten before he even sees the biter coming. Or something like that.

Needless to say, he's going to hate himself if he just hides away and acts as if everything's fine; as if his mother isn't dying. He knows deep down that even if he puts his brave face on, he's going to fall apart the moment his mother leaves the room. He won't let himself break down in front of his mother. He has to be strong for her.

If not her than no one else.

"Percy," she says softly, meeting his eyes and grabbing his hands from across the table. He knows something bad is going to happen. He knows it. Just like he knew when his mother baked him a cake nowhere near his birthday that she was not just feeling generous like she said.

He can already feel his eyes stinging. He keeps them open so they dry up, hoping the tears will take the hint and go away.

"I have two months."

And just like that, in only four words, less than two seconds, and in a sad coffee shop that sells pretty crappy tasting water, his world comes crumbling down around him.

He knows, in the way back parts of his mind, that she's due at some point this year, but he always thought he'd have more time.

More days.

More coffee shop dates where she tells him about large birds.

More cookies.

More swim meets where she's cheering the loudest.

More time.

But he doesn't have more time.

And neither does his mom.

Two months, actually. Only two months.

"But - But, I have an interview next weekend, I can get another job, I can find a way to get more money so we can get better treatment - a - a different doctor, if we have to. Mom, I'll find a way -"

"Percy," she says. "The doctor said that there isn't another way. I'm sorry." She starts to tear up and Percy feels like he's crumbling apart. "I love you, honey." She says it like it's the last time and Percy realizes with a jolt that he will hear her say it for the last time pretty soon.

He begs himself to not start crying in front of her, because she needs him to be strong, as much as it hurts him to be.

"I love you too, mom." so much.

(line break)

Annabeth gets off early.

Suspiciously early.

Her boss came running out of his office with his phone clutched tightly in his fingers. "You're free to go," he said out of breath.

Annabeth backtracked. "But you said I had to restock the nonfiction, and I haven't even started on the -"

"Oh my god!" he yelled. "I don't care, just get out of my store!"

She frowned.

"Calm down, Annabeth, you're my best worker, I'm not firing you, but I have a ninety-eight percent chance of getting laid in this store and I can't do that if you're restocking the nonfiction books, so please get out before I do have to fire you."

Annabeth had stared.

He groaned. "I'll add a dollar to your paycheck."

And with that, she left.

After, she goes to the cafe down the street and gets two coffees. A black coffee for herself and a black coffee with four sugars for Piper. She decides to go give the drink to Piper when she comes home for lunch in between classes (because she's such a nice person), but someone catches her eye.

Percy Jackson, for the second time that day, Annabeth sees him. He's still just as handsome as he was earlier, especially in person, though this time she gets a good look at his face.

But she didn't expect him to be so … anxious? He's tapping his foot and rubbing his hands together, and his eyes never leave the stores front doors, so she assumes he's waiting for someone.

Annabeth leaves the cafe after couple more seconds of mindless staring and bumps into a sweet lady with brown hair and blue eyes on her way out.

She catches the bus on her way home and other than a couple whispering into each other's ears and groping each other like there's no tomorrow, the ride was pretty boring. (Sometimes Annabeth thinks soulmates are sweet, but did they seriously have to do that on the bus? Do they have any hygenial respect for themselves?)

She gets to the building fairly quickly, not like she was in a rush or anything, and rides the elevator with the emo guy who apparently lives with Percy Jackson, and then finally, she's home.

"Piper!" she yells. "I'm back!"

Annabeth hears quite a loud crash and assumes that Piper did not expect her to get home so soon. She especially pronounces this with a few select colourful words.

"Why are you home so freaking early?" Piper asks from her spot on the floor as she gets up and fixes the chair she took down with her.

Annabeth simply rolls her eyes. "I brought you coffee, so stop yelling."

Piper greedily takes the cup. "Don't roll your eyes so much, Banannabeth, you'll be stuck like that forever."

Annabeth blanches. "Okay, no. We're not bringing 'Banannabeth' back. Those were dark times I would not like to be reminded of."

Piper laughs and crosses the kitchen to put her lukewarm coffee in the microwave. "What do you mean 'dark times'? All I remember is Travis telling me that lovely story about the time you -"

"Piper, shut up, please? Or I'll shave your head in your sleep." The threat is risky and loose, but Annabeth takes her chances.

Piper leans up against the counter as she waits for the coffee to heat. "Anything exciting happen today? I mean, besides the fact that you're hours early home from work."

Annabeth chuckles and takes off her bag, setting it down on the floor. "This couple on the bus was basically screwing each other in the seat, oh, and I rode the lift with the emo guy who lives down the hall."

Piper asks, "The one who's gay with Percy Jackson?"

Annabeth nods. "Yes, the one who lives with Percy Jackson."

Piper tuts. "Annie, you can't deny that something's going on between them."

"Have either of us even seen them both in the same room?"

Piper shrugs as the microwave beeps. She also completely ignores Annabeth's question. "Unless, of course, you only say these things because someone might have a cute little crush on our neighborhood Olympic swimmer," she hints while taking her cup from the microwave and blowing lightly on the steam.

Annabeth shifts her weight from one leg to the other in frustration. "I've only ever seen him twice," she protests lightly.

Piper puts her cup down frantically then practically bursts. "Twice? Annie! When was the second time?"

She shrugs. "At the coffee shop." Piper stares at her coffee cup as if it's going to turn into Percy Jackson. "I didn't actually talk to him, but he seemed like he was on a date. Nerves and all. I mean, he bought a water, Pipes."

Piper cringes and turns around to sit at the table. "Water? Must've been a first date then." She gestures for Annabeth to sit next to her. Annabeth complies. "But anyway, you said 'I've only met him twice', if I can recall correctly." She sips her coffee.

"Yes," Annabeth nods, not really understanding where this is going.

"So, that leaves a question."

"Pray tell, my friend. What is this question?"

"Were you protesting that you couldn't date Mr. Jackson because you've only met him twice, or are you saying you can't like him because you've only met him twice." Piper raises a questionable eyebrow.

Annabeth deflects. "He's not my soulmate."

Piper scoffs. "Screw soulmates!" she yells. "Listen, Annie, even if he wasn't your soulmate, which you still don't know because, hey, have you seen his wrist yet? I didn't think so. But even if he isn't your soulmate, that doesn't matter, does it?"

Annabeth shrugs.

"You dated Travis Stoll for four years, and you would've stayed with him if the bloke didn't move off to England to prance around with those tea-drinking suckers."

Annabeth murmurs, "He doesn't prance." Then she says, "I was young, Pipes, I didn't know who my soulmate was, it could've been Travis for all I knew."

"But it wasn't," Piper smirks.

"No, he wasn't," Annabeth repeats, remembering the day at the beach and whoever Katie Gardener is.

Piper pokes Annabeth's arm. "Also, Beth, you knew he wasn't your soulmate." She sighs, "I can remember all those times in middle school where we would sit for hours talking to this mystery guy. It was so unfair, too, you never let me talk to him."

Annabeth laughs, recalling the memory. "He was my soulmate!"

Piper smiles. "And he's still out there, wearing the same silly tattoo, probably wondering what the know-it-all smarty-pants from seventh grade is doing."

Annabeth snorts. "I don't think that's likely."

"And why not?"

"He hasn't written anything in years! Sometimes, I forget and write notes on my arm and he doesn't do anything, like try to scrub it off, or cross it out, or message me back! He gave up, Pipes, he's probably a hot millionaire with a perfect trophy wife and, like, eight kids who drive their own golf carts made out of solid gold to school."

"Annabeth, he can't have eight kids because you're the same age. He would've started making babies when he was, like, fifteen. That's freaking nasty, and if he's your soulmate, I would suggest running."

Annabeth sighs. She wants to take a nap. "I wish I knew his name."

"Why don't you ask him?" Piper asks innocently, taking a sip of coffee yet again.

Annabeth is taken aback. "I can't just ask him, Piper, that's not how it works. We stopped talking years ago. It would be like if I hit up Drew Tanaka from kindergarten and asked to go for lunch, it's not normal."

Piper cringes. "Drew was horrible."

"She probably still is. Which is why I'm not asking her for lunch anytime soon."

Piper sits up, as if she's recalled something. "Wait, Annabeth Chase, you were the one who stopped talking to your poor soulmate in the first place."

Annabeth says, "You cannot hold me to that."

"I remember that!" Piper says, standing up excitedly and accusingly. "You told me you were going to stop talking to him -"

"This was, you remember," Annabeth says, standing up to defend herself, "right after Travis and I started dating, right before high school."

Piper laughs. "You are so horrible, Beth. You, also, can't be mad at him for not talking to you when you made it clear you didn't want to talk to him all those freaking years ago." Piper is grinning like the Cheshire Cat. "You're going to talk to him."

Piper marches through the kitchen and grabs a pen from the counter. Annabeth blanches. "I am not going to talk to him, Piper, do you understand?"

Piper rolls her eyes and comes back to her friend, uncapping the pen. "Right, yeah, Drew Tanaka, out for lunch, blah, blah, blah. Now, hand me your arm."

Annabeth staggers. "No." It's too sudden, she thinks. She needs time to prepare. Come on, what will she do when he actually responds? If he does.

Piper just rolls her eyes again and steps towards Annabeth. "Come on, lady, you just need to at least say 'hi', then wait. Very simple process, really."

"No," Annabeth says firmly, backing away slowly from Piper into the living room. "Piper, I will literally do anything for you."

"All my dishes for the rest of my life?"

"Yes."

"Too bad, I find doing the dishes therapeutic."

"No, you don't, you literally paid me forty-five dollars and a massage to do your dishes last week."

Piper doesn't back down, she smirks as Annabeth's knees hit the side of the couch. She's trapped.

Annabeth wracks her brain for a valuable excuse. "I'll talk to Percy Jackson! I will ask him on a date, and take him to the fanciest restaurant and I'll even throw in a kiss, maybe."

Piper's smug smirk doesn't fade. Annabeth flinches. "Any person whose soul is linked with my Annie is so much better than Percy Jackson."

And then Piper tackles her.

It's all very surprising and very informative, considering Annabeth had no idea Piper was that strong what is this?

Annabeth is on her back on the couch, her arms raised above her head in an attempt to keep them from Piper's reach. Said Piper is literally laying on top of Annabeth, just a little too short to reach Annabeth's sweatshirt sleeves and pull them down to reach her wrists. "Piper, what the hell?"

Piper grunts, trying to shift herself further. "Just let me write on your freaking arm, Chase!"

"He's my soulmate!"

"Which is why you're going to talk to him."

"Which is why I should be able to choose whether I talk to him or not."

Piper gets one of her fingers around the little hole where Annabeth's thumb is supposed to go. In a state of frenzy, Annabeth rolls over, so Piper hits the floor and Annabeth lands on top of her. With her new found freedom, Annabeth leaps up and makes a run for it, but before she knows it, Piper literally has her pressed up against the wall and is pulling her sweatshirt off her head.

"This will be good for you, Annabeth, just stop squirming."

"Oh my god, Piper, no!" Annabeth's pleads are muffled under her sweatshirt which was almost off her head.

"Um, hello….?" A new voice.

Male. Deep. Stunningly deep, actually.

Annabeth feels Piper leap from her and in a second, Annabeth has her sweatshirt back over her body and is face to face with a guy whom she'd never seen before.

In her apartment.

"The door was open," he says, but Annabeth isn't really paying attention, she's looking at his eyes. "I thought someone might've broken in, and then I heard fighting, but, um, I see that I was mistaken. My apologies."

His eyes, though.

His bright, sky blue eye and the ever-changing, kaleidoscope eye.

He's Piper's soulmate.

Annabeth glances to her friend, but Piper had left the room, probably ran when she let go of Annabeth. "Oh," Annabeth says, realizing she's the only other person in the room. "Yeah, thank you." She doesn't see a reason to protest that neither her nor Piper are gay and they were fighting over Annabeth's soulmate, and they were not just about to have sex. "We'll make sure to close it next time."

She cringes at her own words, but sees him out and makes sure to lock it behind him.

"Annabeth," she said before he had left. "And she was Piper."

His two eyes glittered.

"Dean, Dean Phillips."

Annabeth runs into the kitchen where Piper sits at the table, stressfully chugging the entire cup of coffee in one gulp. "Piper, holy crap, excuse my French, but wow, we just met your soulmate."

Piper puts down the cup and says with a hoarse voice, "He was freaking hot."

Annabeth nods.

"No, Annie, he was - god, he was beautiful. How can I compete with that?"

Annabeth scoffs and rolls her eyes. "First of all, you don't compete, you go out with him."

Piper laughs as if Annabeth is the crazy one. "You're insane, Annabeth, he's too hot for me. You know how I have trust issues, and girls will be throwing themselves at him left and right. It wouldn't be fair to either of us."

Annabeth thinks for a moment before sitting down excitedly in front of Piper in the chair she was previously occupying. "I'll make us a deal." Piper nods. "The day you go on a date with Dean, his name is Dean, by the way, is the day I'll talk to my soulmate."

Piper doesn't hesitate and stands up, running out of the apartment door to find Dean.

Annabeth stays sitting at the table, looking at the uncapped pen on the counter and wondering what she had just gotten herself into.

(line break)

 **hi hello there**

 **sorry about the weird line breaks i'm uploading this from the app because i wanted to upload before school so yeah there's that**

 **DUN DUN DUUUUUUN**

 **so jason is not pipers soulmate????!!!!!??! what will come of that???? who knows. well, i do, but i won't tell you.**

 **i'm so tired right now it's like 7am and i'm eating my breakfast while doing this. also i have a spanish test today and a performance in theater! woop to the first week of school!**

 **okay. i gotta go, but make sure you don't forget to review! i love positive feedback and constructive criticism, so please! tell me what you thought!**

 **anyway, i hope you're all having a fantastic friday, i'll see you next week then!**

 **\- leigh**


	5. Chapter 5

_Chapter Five_

" _Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?"_

 _-Mary Oliver_

* * *

Piper and Dean go on a date to the movies not one week later.

Annabeth does pretty much anything to stall writing on her arm.

She vacuums the entire flat, mops the floors, she even starts brainstorming her book, though she doesn't get very far. She watches a YouTube tutorial on how to do a smokey eye, because she never understood how to do it. She watches with envy as the girl on her computer put the foundation on the back of her hand before putting it on her face and wonders what it would be like to have that much freedom. Then she figures she's being overdramatic and decides to do all her laundry.

When meeting her neighbor that may or may not live with Percy Jackson (Annabeth finds out his name is Nico), she pretends like she has nothing important to do and says yes to playing a game of Mythomagic with him.

He beats her, obviously, and then the machine beeps and her clothes are done. She bids Nico a goodbye, saying she hopes she runs into him again so they could have a rematch. When Annabeth gets back to the flat, she irons (for the first time ever) all the clothes, folds them, and puts them away. She folds the towels neatly, then tears them down again and looks up towel origami on YouTube and spends a full twenty minutes attempting that.

And then she sits on the couch, scrolling on her phone for twenty minutes. Annabeth turns on the telly and changes it to the one gossip channel she can't really explain. It's the dirt on every celebrity, every scandal, every conspiracy, all of it. Annabeth finds the show incredibly annoying, but watches it anyway.

The beautiful and chipper face of Aphrodite pops up on her screen, she's just finished a segment on "Who Will Taylor Swift Date Next?!" and is going into the newest news as of late. (And by that, it means she is giving you the tea that literally came out minutes before the show started).

"It is rumoured," Aphrodite starts, "that hottie, Olympic swimmer Percy Jackson is in a secret relationship. Four teens direct messaged our twitter account with a hot story and even hotter pictures." She winks. A picture appears on the screen of Percy Jackson. Annabeth blanches openly. He's shirtless, dripping wet, his cheeks are flushed. He's wearing the swim trunks Annabeth first saw him in. It's clear that the picture was taken to his surprise and he didn't know what was going on. He's slightly adorable. "Teens stated that they went to go to their apartment indoor pool but caught sight of quite a magnificent fish in the waters. And what a catch he is!" The host laughs at her own joke. "Jackson came out of the water, without a towel, and the girls reported him in a rush, as if on his way to meet someone in a hurry." Aphrodite raises an eyebrow and hums. "The girls even reported seeing a tatt-"

Annabeth shuts the t.v. off and groans. She really couldn't care less what secret relationships celebrities are in. Absentmindedly, she rubs the tattoo and sees that it's gotten better. If she wasn't such a coward, she'd thank her soulmate for putting whatever cream on the tattoo because it was really starting to irritate her skin. She'd hate to go to the doctors about an infected tattoo she didn't even get herself.

The thing is, Annabeth sorta wants to talk to him. She wants to understand who he is and what the tattoo means. She wants her fairytale soulmate, but she's scared he's already given up on her.

But, Annabeth realizes, at some point in her very boring life, she has to do something brave. So, with newfound determination, Annabeth throws caution to the wind and hurls common sense out the window. She marches to the kitchen and grabs the pen Piper had threatened her with all that time ago.

She writes.

Then she puts the pen down, grabs a sweatshirt, making sure to cover her entire arm all the way to her knuckles, and takes a cabbie to the liquor store. She needs to be at least tipsy when, or if, he responds.

* * *

 _fun fact: my name has an S in it, so thanks for getting a tattoo for me._

Percy's about to take a shower when he sees it.

He had just turned the water on, set up his towel, and only taken off his shirt and there it is.

His soulmate responds.

He knew she was alive, but for the first time since eighth grade, she is actually addressing _him_.

Quickly, he scrambles back into his room and grabs a sharpie from the desk, then he runs back to the bathroom.

It's a huge mood change from what he was feeling earlier.

When he got back to the flat, Jason and Nico were watching The Walking Dead and sharing conspiracies. He walked in soaking wet (it was raining outside) with a heavy heart. The two cousins shut the t.v. off and made Percy hot chocolate. For awhile, they all just sat, sipping their hot drinks.

"My mom has two months to live."

And then he started crying. It wasn't sobbing. It was just him breaking down. Jason and Nico kindly rubbed his back and told him that things were going to get better. Eventually.

He soon retired to the bathroom to take a shower.

And then the note popped up.

He stares at it for a few moments, memorizing the way she wrote each letter, and then he gets a washcloth and soap and wipes off, making room for his own writings. (Honestly, you can't expect him to try and write with his left hand.)

He sits back down with a freshly naked arm, forget the tattoo, of course, when a thought comes to him.

He has no idea what he's going to write.

Should he be snarky back? Should he just say 'hello'? Should he make an inside joke? Did they even have inside jokes? Should he write in all caps demanding an explanation? Should he even respond?

Of course I should, Percy thinks, being a dick will get you nowhere. Plus, maybe having someone to talk to who doesn't know about his mom, or who he is (y'know, Percy Jackson, all time famous Olympic swimmer?) will be good for him.

 _Trust me_ , he writes _, I got it just for you. ;)_

Flirtation levels: high school jock. Desperation levels: incredibly lonely.

Percy figures that if she can't handle his winky face, she couldn't handle him at all.

(He doesn't take a shower because he's afraid he might wash if off before she sees it)

* * *

 **hi hello how are you all**

 **im sorry about the short chapter, when i went it and marked all the chapters i guess i overestimated how long they would all be, so sorry. again**

 **DUN DUN DUUUUUUn annabeth finally said something to her soulmate. and yikes for percy amirite? but also he gets to talk to his soulmate now which is awesome! go them!**

 **i don't really have much else to say except that i hope you all have a wonderful rest of your friday (im just happy for the weekend) and don't forget to review! if you want! you don't have to! but it would be appreciated!**

 **anyway**

 **\- leigh**


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter Six

"Big things often have small beginnings."

Unknown

{line break}

Annabeth starts to believe that waking up with something new on her arm is a tradition she's not sure she can get used to.

This morning, her dream was about flying motorcycles and chlorine in her eyes. At least, that's all she could remember of it when she felt Piper's knees in her back, waking her up from her peace. "Seriously, Pipes, you have your own bed!" she grumbles, her voice low and deep from sleep.

Piper mumbles in her dream state, but she kicks Annabeth in the back of the shins, hard. And clearly purposefully.

This morning, though, as a contrary to yesterday, Annabeth goes straight to the kitchen for coffee. She doesn't have work today, but she does have to buy groceries and all that. While waiting for the coffee to brew, Annabeth remembers writing to her soulmate. She has a very strong feeling he didn't write back, but she checks anyway.

 _Trust me, I got it just for you. ;)_

Oh god, she thinks, a winky face? It's a start though, she knows. He did write back. It even brought a small smile to her face.

"What are you all smiley about?" Piper asks, coming into the kitchen with a smirk on her face. "Your soulmate write back?" she teases.

"Actually," Annabeth says, leaning back on the counter with a smile she couldn't get rid of. "He did."

Piper blanches. "No. Annabeth!" She explodes, coming up to her roommate and grabbing her wrists and bouncing on her toes. "That's awesome! I didn't think you'd actually do it, but wow! I'm so proud of you." Piper's grin is contagious and Annabeth feels her excitement. "What did you say?"

Annabeth hunches her shoulders in mild embarrassment, her cheeks flushing pink. "I said: fun fact: my name has an S in it, so thanks for getting a tattoo for me."

Yeah, she memorized it. How could she not after staring at her arm for hours, waiting to see if he'd write back or not.

Piper stares at her for a few seconds before grinning again. "You're so quirky and awkward, Annabeth. What did he say?"

Annabeth holds out her arm for Piper to see. Piper reads it for a few moments before looking up at Annabeth with sparkling eyes, a smile growing on her face. "He's totally flirting with you."

Annabeth watches with her mouth agape as Piper moves on to make her own cup of coffee. "No, he's not flirting with me. It was the second thing he's said since, what, ten years ago?"

Piper disregards her. "Ten years ago, you were ten. It was more like seven years ago, actually."

Annabeth shifts her weight from one foot to the other. "Well, he's not flirting with me. We just started talking. He probably still hates me and he's just egging me on to embarrass me. Maybe we'll talk and plan to meet up, and then he won't show and then he never talks to me again because, I don't know, he wants to get me back for what I did to him in high school."

"Annabeth," Piper says, putting too much sugar in her coffee. "Don't let your mess of anxiety leak into this. Your soulmate will love you, and he will forget what you did, because you will apologize."

Annabeth sits down at the table, stirring a spoon in her coffee. She changes the subject. "How was your date with Dean last night?"

Piper sits down, stirring her coffee as well. "It was fine. We got dinner at the pizza place down the street, then saw a movie."

"Well," Annabeth says, smiling smugly, "how was going on a date with your soulmate, Pipes? Was it magical? Did you have a spark?"

Piper sighs, she puts her spoon down on a napkin and looks off in the distance for a few moments in thought. "He's very handsome." She sips her coffee.

Annabeth blanks for a second. "Handsome? Well, yeah, but Piper, he's your soulmate."

"Yes, he is, isn't he."

"You're acting weird."

Piper slumps in her seat in defeat. "Listen, Annabeth, you know more than anyone that I just don't care about soulmates. Sure, we have the same weird eyes, but whatever, I want to be with someone because I like them, not because their soul is linked with mine."

Annabeth blinks. "Yet, you're pushing me to write to my soulmate."

"You care, Annabeth," Piper says. "You have hope and a light in your equivalent grey eyes. You weren't tormented like I was in school. Remember that?"

Annabeth nods. For years, all the kids in school called Piper any variation from 'crazy eyes', to 'mad scientist'. It was brutal.

Piper sighs. "I'm just - I just want to settle down with someone who doesn't believe this whole soulmate thing is it. I don't want Dean to think that just because we share eye colours means we're getting married tomorrow. I want to have options."

Annabeth nods, then smirks. "But he was cute, wasn't he?"

Piper nods. "A great kisser, too."

She gasps. "Piper, no! On the first date?"

Piper chuckles, stirring her coffee once more. "Well, the movie was boring and I have no shame."

Annabeth laughs with her friend and sips her coffee. "I have to go, actually. You have classes and we're almost out of every food item in our apartment."

"Wait, Annie," Piper says as Annabeth rinses her mug in the sink. "Before you go, can you do me a favour and write to your soulmate please? And if he responds, you have to send a picture because I have really sucky classes today and that will cheer me up."

Annabeth rolls her eyes, but nods. "For sure, Pipes."

Later, alone in her room, Annabeth rolls up the sleeves of her jacket and writes: _maybe today, I'll get you a tattoo. Say, you don't happen to be into tigers at all? Because I was thinking of one right across my back._

{line break}

 **hi hello how are you all**

 **listen, i'm just as mad about the short chapter as you guys. buuuuuuuut like i said in the first chapter, short chapters and cut offs are important for _dramatics_ of course. **

**and yes i know i'm uploading this a day early, but tomorrow i'm getting my wisdom teeth taken out and then i'm just gonna sleep all day so i probably won't remember to upload so i'm doing it a day early! how exciting!**

 **i'm just excited to miss a day of school honestly.**

 **i hope you all have a great day today and tomorrow and every day! i'll see you all on next friday!**

 **\- leigh**


	7. Chapter 7

_Chapter Seven_

 _"I sometimes wonder why I even bother."_

 _Unknown (an actual quote by every single student known to man)_

{line break}

Percy wakes up with someone kneeing his back and someone's elbow in his face.

It took him a minute to realize he was in a bed with two other people.

"What the heck, you guys! You have your own beds, yeah?" Percy groans, shoving Jason's arm off his face and kicking Nico's foot off his back.

The two others groan. "Too early, Percy," Nico grumbles.

"What are you doing in my bed?"

Jason pulls the covers over his head and says with a muffled voice, "You looked all sad last night in this big bed by yourself, so we figured you'd enjoy some company. Sorry for sparing your precious feelings."

Percy rolls his eyes. "I didn't go through a breakup, I always sleep alone."

Nico shoves his face in the pillow. "We know, but Jason insisted."

"I'm getting breakfast. Waffles, anyone?" Percy gets out of the bed, adjusting his t-shirt because it got twisted while sleeping.

The two cousins groan and Percy takes that as a 'yes'.

Percy doesn't bother changing into actual clothes, because, hey, it's eight a.m., there won't be anyone at the diner.

There's this little diner attached to his apartment complex, it's opposite the service elevators and the number one reason Percy is still alive, probably.

Quickly, he puts his phone in the pockets of his gym shorts. He leaves the keys on the counter because neither Jason nor Nico will a) be awake when he gets back or b) check to see if the door is locked; though, if a meteor struck, and Percy gets locked out, he can just use the set of keys they unprotectedly leave under the doormat.

Percy takes the lift with the cute blonde he seems to always see. He takes note of how much she smell so much like peaches (it's a small elevator, give him a break). Once they come to the lobby, she goes to the main doors and exits; Percy, though, takes a right into the small breakfast diner. The smell of the bitter coffee and sweet donuts overwhelms him, though he pays no mind to it, because as soon as he walk in, every single person in the room looks at him with burning gazes.

And, okay, he's used to stares and glances and the occasional not-so-sneaky sneaky photo from behind a box of cereal at Target, but he's an Olympic swimmer. Not that many people are into the Olympics and half of them actually watch the swimming portion. It's not possible that that small number of people just so happen to want waffles at the diner next to Percy's flat.

So, he's suspicious.

And, god, all he wants is some waffles. If anything, just the waffles.

But as he makes the, maybe, four step walk to the counter, a group of three older teenagers walk up to him. A boy with a black hoodie, a girl with super huge curly hair, and another girl with a fancy, professional camera around her neck, and glasses. The boy confronts Percy and the others block his path to the counter. "You're Percy Jackson, yeah?"

Percy recoils from them, but finds yet another teenager, who looks like a film club journalist, behind him. "Uhh," he says, feeling more than uncomfortable. "Yeah, that's me, I guess."

The boy speaks up again. "We were wondering if we could ask a few questions…?"

Percy glances at the counter, in hopes a worker there could possibly take pity on him and save him. But there's nobody there, and the rest of the customers looked weary, but unwilling to step in. "Listen," he says, "I just wanted to get some waffles for my cousins, it's early-"

"Cousins, you say?" one of the girls speaks, the one with the curly hair. "You have cousins that live here?"

"Yeah?" He doesn't understand the questions and why they seem so cryptic for a bunch of high schoolers, but really, he starts to feel anxious, and sweaty, very sweaty.

"Are you sure they're cousins," this time it's the camera one, "or is it a girl, perhaps? A secret relationship you're hiding?"

Percy feels like the walls are closing in on him. Too many questions, too many people, too much. The Boy starts writing what he says down on a notepad. "What?" he says finally. "I don't have a girlfriend, or a secret relationship. My cousins are literally asleep upstairs."

"Is it true you have a soulmate mark?" Journalist Girl asks, quirking an eyebrow at him.

Percy doesn't understand. "Um, no, that's-- no, I don't have a soulmate mark."

"Well, then, what's the 'S' on your arm for? If it's not a soulmate mark, then it's gotta be something, right?" Curly Hair says.

Percy feels like he's suffocating. He really doesn't want to tell a bunch of teenagers about his mom. Especially after what happened yesterday.

Two months.

"Um," Percy panics, he's not sure why the room feels dizzy, "It's a tattoo," the truth is the easy route; lies can create chaos, and Percy's not sure he can take anymore chaos.

"For who?" Camera Girl asks, snapping a picture of his profile. Percy winces, it's too early for the flash in his face.

"Guys, please, I just want some waffles-" he feels disoriented, light-headed if anything.

"One more question, Mr. Jackson." The Boy furiously writes in his notepad, and Percy wonders why he doesn't just record the conversation and take notes later. "Could we please take a picture of your new tattoo?"

Percy wants, with every bone in his body, to say no, kindly shove off, please, but he does have a reputation (?) to uphold and rolls up his sleeve. He doesn't look but each kid crowds his wrist. Curly Hair grabs his hand to hold it there while Camera Girl takes the photo. Journalist Girl adjusts her glasses and smiles at him smugly. "Thank you, Mr. Jackson, for your time. And thanks for the picture." She smirks as she walks away.

The others follow her like ducks, though as soon as they left the front doors, they all crowded around Camera Girl as she showed them the pictures she took. Percy sighs as he watches them, the world subtlety coming back to it's non-dizzy ways, and turns to the counter. Sure enough, a worker stands there, pushing keys slowly on the register and taking curious glances at Percy.

Percy internally groans and walks to the counter. "Can I have three waffles, please? To go."

{line break}

Annabeth hates shopping.

It's a fact of life.

It's not just grocery shopping, though. Clothes, food, cars, houses, everything shopping is horrific. Maybe it's the part where she has to stand for hours, looking at small details of almost every item in the shop, and each time, each item is just not good enough. Or Piper's allergic to something that's in the ingredients. Or Piper's vegetarian lifestyle clashes with it. And then it just takes more hours. Or maybe it's the part where so many other people are all out shopping. They all want the specific sauce that lays just above or below the sauce that Annabeth needs, causing them to block the one specific sauce as they read the Nutrition Facts as if it's a really good book.

Whatever it may be, Annabeth hates shopping.

So Tuesday morning, at eight-something-a.m., Annabeth just wants to get out. She has already gotten everything she needs and is in line behind a man who bought two dozen different roses.

And each of them need to be scanned separately.

Except there's no barcode to scan, so the worker has to look up each different rose in her little book, input the code, and press a number of buttons on the machine, and do the next one. The whole process makes Annabeth want to scream. (Also, it's eight-something-a.m. and the one worker is the only one on any of the registers, so she's stuck.)

Her feet hurt, she's very tired, and she knows that she will definitely go back to sleep once she gets home, and she very much wants to give Mr. Flowers ahead of her just a few colourful words of her own.

But then the guy glances in Annabeth's direction and to her pleasure, or indefinite demise, she recognizes him. "Dean?" she says.

He frowns at her. "Sorry, I.."

She shakes her head. "No, it's okay, I'm Annabeth, Piper's roommate."

His mismatched eyes light up with recognition. "I knew you looked familiar, but I couldn't place it. Sorry."

It hits Annabeth then that the flowers are for Piper.

Dean follows her gaze and smiles. "I wanted to get a bunch of different ones, because it's sorta symbolic. Y'know, mismatched flowers, mismatched eyes…. I just didn't think it'd take this long." Unknowing to him, the worker scanning the flowers scowls at him.

"That's very… sweet," Annabeth supplies. She doesn't have the heart to tell him that yellow carnations mean romantic rejection, jealousy, and sometimes disdain.

Dean cringes. "You don't think she'll like them?"

"No!" Annabeth assures. "She'll love them, but, I don't know, I haven't been on an actual date in a while--" did she really just admit that to a practical stranger? "--but, isn't only one date a little early for all this?"

He smiles. "We're soulmates," he puts simply. Dean looks back to the flowers. "There's no point in going slow if we know we'll be together."

He's very sweet, so Annabeth doesn't tell him that Piper thinks very differently.

"I heard you two had a nice time last night?" Annabeth offers, trying to start conversation while the worker had a few more flowers to go.

Dean's eyes light up. "It was amazing. Piper is a very wonderful person."

It kind of hurts to much to listen to this, all the while Piper really doesn't have much intention of ever seeing him again, so Annabeth just nods in agreement, watching the worker hand Dean his flowers and sigh. "Thank you, come again. Next!"

{line break}

Annabeth starts to think that maybe the Fates are out to get her.

First, shopping at eight in the morning, and then she has to carry pounds of groceries by herself.

They seem to laugh at her by making the bags so awkward to hold, she can't grab her phone and text Piper.

Then the Fates seem to apologize by giving her a handsome, strong boy.

His name is Jason, she learns, on the elevator ride up. He does, in fact, live with Nico down the hall from them, and he thinks that having their key under the welcome mat is stupid and he'll have to look into fixing that. She also learns that he loves to watch the Olympics and he goes to Piper's college, studying law, in hopes to become a lawyer. She learns that he can't see without his dorky glasses and he is, in fact, very, very strong.

It was a long elevator ride.

He agrees to help her take her bags into her apartment, as it is no physical strain to him, and it's on the way to his flat.

Annabeth bumps the door open with her elbow, knowing it's unlocked because Piper has not one care in the world. "Piper! I brought groceries."

Piper enters the room looking disheveled. "Sorry, Annie, I was watching Netflix, there was this new movie I hadn't seen yet--oh, hi. I'm Piper."

The dweeb with the glasses falling down his nose smiles. "Jason."

Annabeth, sensing something going on, says, "Here, Jason, you can put the bags on the table."

He does as so and smiles at Annabeth. "Lovely riding the lift with you, Annabeth. Piper."

Jason walks out, closing the door behind him.

Annabeth instantly rounds on Piper. "Okay. Ex-Boyfriend? Because that was so awkward? I thought someone was going to explode, the emotions were so condensed."

Piper shrugs. "I've literally never met him before."

Annabeth's shoulders drop. "No. You're lying."

"Nope," she says, shifting through the groceries. "He was hot, though, right? What with the blonde and glasses and did you see that scar on his lip? Cause I did. Also his eyes are the same colour--"

"Sexual tension, that's what it was!"

Piper smirks at her roommate over her shoulder. "Shut up. Also, he's in my English Lit. class."

{line break}

 **hello hello how are you all**

 **i really don't like uploading from my phone but i woke up really late so i don't honestly have a choice????**

 **anyway today's chapter was above 2 thousand words so it's longer than usual and so is next weeks chapter! yaaaaaaaay**

 **(thank you to everyone who wished me good luck with my wisdom teeth thing. it was fine, but of course it still hurt a lot)**

 **anyway i hope you guys have a great friday (and a fantastic weekend!) please don't forget to review!**

 **i larb you all!**

 **(also over 100 favorites, thank you!)**

 **\- leigh**


	8. Chapter 8

_Chapter Eight_

" _And then my soul saw you and it kind of went, 'Oh, there you are, I've been looking for you.'"_

 _Unknown_

* * *

Percy walks into the apartment. "Where's Jason?" he asks Nico who sits slumped at the kitchen island, scrolling on his phone.

"Went to get the mail, he should be here any second."

Percy puts the bag of waffles on the table and sighs, running his hands through his hair. "Sometimes, Nico…" he starts.

"Here we go," Nico grumbles, but kindly shuts off his phone and guides his attention to Percy.

"Sometimes, I wonder if the whole 'Olympic Swimmer' jig is even worth it. I mean, I love swimming, but so does that weird lady who lives next door, and she's not a gold medal Olympian. People are just so persistent. Gods, I just wonder what it would be like to be normal."

Nico blinks at him. "Well, Percy, famous or not, you will never be normal."

Percy squints at him. "Nice comeback, you third grader. I just spilled my emo guts on your lap and that's what I get? An insult?"

"Hey, by the way," Nico mentions, disregarding Percy. "You-Know-Who invited the three of us to his huge family reunion. You're going, by the way. So am I, and so is Jason."

"Voldemort?" Percy asks.

Nico makes a face at him. "No, you twelve year old, your grandfather, the one guy who's so much of a dickhead, we don't speak his name. That one."

"Well, clearly," Percy says, "I didn't know who."

Nico laughs, but shakes his head. "You're such a dweeb."

Jason takes that moment to make his grand entrance. "I just saw the love of my life."

Nico rolls his eyes, but Percy asks, "You met your soulmate?"

"Well," Jason says, opening the fridge to grab a bottle of water. "No, but I'm already in love with her, so I don't think that matters."

"What'd she look like?" Nico goes back to playing on his phone.

"Well, beautiful, for one, and she had different coloured eyes-"

"Hey," Percy says, "I've seen her before. She's got kinda dark skin with a really awful haircut."

"But she pulls it off so well?"

"Yeah, that's her!"

Nico smirks. "I swear, I'm the straightest one here, and my soulmates' a guy."

"Anyway," Jason says, directing his story to Percy, who was actually interested in listening. "I helped this blonde girl, Piper's roommate-"

"Who's Piper?" Nico asks this time.

"The love of my life.-"

"And the blonde chick?"

"Piper's roommate. I don't know, scary grey eyes, but a sweet personality-"

"I've met her," Nico says. "We played Mythomagic on top of washing machines. She was nice, but she sucked at playing."

"Anyway," Jason urges, just wanting to tell his story. "I was helping blonde-girl-who-supposedly-sucks-at-Mythomagic with her groceries-"

"Wait," Percy interrupts, "what was her name?"

"It doesn't matter," Jason groans and Nico chuckles. "Anyway, we came into her apartment and there she was."

He stops his story and Percy backtracks once he realizes that Jason's story is over. "That's it?" Nico blanches. "Dude, Jason, that story sucked. And didn't you say different coloured eyes? That's some sort of soulmate mark, I'm sure. She's already attached, man."

"Technicalities," Jason waves him off.

Percy's phone rings in his pocket and his two cousins start fighting over the waffles. The caller-ID says: _!Mom_ , so he takes it to his room.

Percy takes a deep breath before answering. "Hey, mom."

"Hi, sweetie, how's your morning so far?"

Utterly horrible. "It was fine, yours?"

"Lovely," she says. "I woke up early and watched the sunrise. I think I'm going to start doing that more often." His heart clenches. "But, honey, I was wondering if you'd like to get lunch? I could make some sandwiches, we'll make some cookies, does that sound good?"  
"Sounds perfect, mom. What time?"  
She hums. "How about half twelve?"

He nods, but realizes she can't see him. "Perfect."

"I'll see you then," she says, "I love you."

"I love you too, mom." so much.

He puts the phone down on his desk and sits on the edge of his bed.

And then he cries.

* * *

Aphrodite smiles beautifully at the audience she knows is watching at home. "And, as our sources say, Percy Jackson lives with his cousins in The Dakota Apartment complex on the corner of Central Park West and 72nd Street." A picture of Percy Jackson shows up on the screen, it's his profile shot and he looks incredibly distressed.

"Though," Aphrodite smirks, "Us fans out here aren't too convinced when he says 'cousins'. Is it possible that Percy could have a girl up there? Maybe a secret relationship he seems too eager to keep a secret? Perhaps he is telling the truth, but what about his soulmate mark? Reports show from a group of teens who interviewed Mr. Jackson just this morning at a small diner attached to the apartments. They say that though Jackson did deny the mark on his arm for his soulmate, those of us out here can only hope he's lying." Aphrodite throws a hinting smirk at the camera, before delving further into the story.

"Are you really watching that instead of helping me put the groceries away?" Annabeth catches Piper sitting on the couch, remote in hand, watching the telly with utmost attention.

Aphrodite, though, continues on about the Olympic swimmer. "For those wondering, Percy's possible soulmate mark is the first letter of the first name of his soulmate on his left wrist, so any of you out there who's name starts with-"

"Okay," Piper says, "what the hell. I was just about to find out if I could be his soulmate. You, Annabeth, are a life ruiner."

Annabeth rolls her eyes and throws the remote back on the couch. Just before Aphrodite could reveal that one of the millions of people who watch her show could be Percy Jackson's soulmate, Annabeth grabbed the remote from Piper and turned the t.v. off.

"Who knows," Piper stands up to face Annabeth, "he could even be your soulmate."

Annabeth makes a face at Piper and crosses her arm. "I don't have a soulmate mark."

Piper smirks. "But you do have the first letter of somebody's name on the inside of your left wrist."

"It's a tattoo that my weirdo of a soulmate got."

"Who says that's not Percy Jackson?"

Annabeth grabs the remote and turns the t.v. on in less than a heartbeat, though Aphrodite had moved on from that topic and is now blabbing on in her segment called: "Which Movie Will Meryl Streep Own Next?!". Annabeth shuts the telly off and throws the remote down like she had done a minute ago. "I guess we'll never know." Piper shrugs. Annabeth starts walking to the kitchen.

"C'mon, Pipes, you have twenty minutes until your next class starts, I have a dentist appointment in fifteen minutes, and I need help with the groceries."

Piper groans but helps anyway.

"Guess who I ran into today?" Annabeth asks while putting apples in a basket on the table.

Piper shifts through a bag. "Percy Jackson again?"

Annabeth frowns. "Actually, yes. On the elevator ride down. But guess who else I ran into?"

"Ryan Gosling?"

"You suck at guessing." Annabeth starts stacking the oranges on top of the apples. "No, I saw Dean Phillips, none other than your soulmate, at the grocery store."

Piper stops and looks at Annabeth. "You didn't ruin my life, did you?"

"No, not at all," she assures. "We exchanged pleasantries, he said he had a wonderful time and he really likes you, and also he's buying you over a dozen roses, and then we said good-bye, and I bought my food. Nothing out of the ordinary."

Piper's hands drop to her sides in defeat. "Please tell me he didn't get me over a dozen roses. God, I should've told him last night how much I hate flowers because they make my nose itchy."

Annabeth rolls her eyes. "For the millionth time, you're probably mildly allergic to flowers."

"Every single flower ever?" Piper scoffs and starts putting cereal boxes in the cupboards. "Highly unlikely. Maybe after Dean gives me the flowers, I can take some Claritin and give 'em to Jason. He'll like roses, right?"

"Piper, you can't give Jason flowers."

"Why not?"

Annabeth watches as her best friend moves around the kitchen. "You're dating Dean."

"I'm not 'dating' Dean. I went on one measly date with him and, yeah, he's hot and, okay, he's a great kisser, but I want to date Jason. Why? I don't know."

"Piper," Annabeth says warningly. "You may not be bound to soulmates, but Dean is."

"So, I should just keep dating him, even if I don't want to?"

"No, I just think you should be at least a bit considerate when you break the news that you don't want to continue with him."

Piper closes the cereal cabinet.

* * *

 **hello hello there**

 **i have literally two minutes until i have to leave for school so all im gonna say is that i hope you liked the chapter, don't forget to review (because i read and love all of them :)), and have a beautiful friday!**

 **\- leigh**


	9. Chapter 9

Chapter Nine

" _Instead of heading towards a big mental breakdown, I decided to have a small breakdown every Tuesday evening._ " _\- Graham Parke, No Hope For Gomez!_

* * *

Unfortunately, Percy is quite familiar with crying.

Ever since senior year, he's had moments where he just breaks down.

So, he knows what to do after in order to make himself feel better. Take a shower, and eat.

Give him a break, it's what's always worked.

So after his shower (in which Percy makes sure to not wash his arm, because the tattoo guy said his wrist would hurt and washing it would be a huge pain, and also because his soulmate wrote him back and he hadn't the chance to read it yet), Percy is determined to write to his soulmate, then eat, or possibly murder his cousins for eating his waffle.

 _maybe today, I'll get you a tattoo. Say, you don't happen to be into tigers at all? Because I was thinking of one right across my back._

Very clever, he thinks, chuckling. He thinks for a second, before saying: _are you sure about a tiger? I was thinking more of a fire-breathing dragon, but not on my back, just a full body tattoo. Do they do those?_

He caps his sharpie pen and rolls his sleeve down, but runs his finger over the 's' first, feeling the familiar pressure and ache in his chest. He tugs the sleeve down and stands up, he already took his shower, crying again is not a part of the routine.

When he gets into the kitchen, both Nico and Jason are arguing. "Whoa, where's the fire?" Percy asks.

Nico frowns. "I… don't think you used that correctly." He grabs the paper bag that once held three waffles in it off the counter.

Jason glares at Nico and grabs the bag back from him. "We're trying to decide who gets to eat your waffle."

Percy makes a face and takes the bag from him. "Uh, I do. It's my waffle, and I paid for it." He pulls the soggy waffle from the bag and takes a bite out of it.

Nico is, once again, scrolling on his phone. "You're famous, Percy, you know that?"

Percy frowns into his waffle. "Yeah? I did, actually."

Jason goes into the living room and sits on the couch, searching through the cushions for the remote. "He means that you're all over the news."

"Not, like, Channel Six, or anything, but Aphrodite's gossip news channel," Nico adds. "Everyone in practically the whole world wants to know the secret of your soulmate mark."

That had always been a problem.

Percy is normal. No nasty scars (except for the one just above his eyebrow when he, Jason, and Nico decided to test out their driving skills when they were eleven; they crashed into a tree), no crazy tattoos that don't seem to have a meaning, no Names, no First Words; at one point, the world concluded that Percy Jackson was born without a soulmate. He always knew they were wrong, he does have a soulmate, she just decided to ignore him for seven years, but he didn't tell anyone that. Better to leave them in the dark, rather than cause an uproar.

So now that presumed-no-soulmate-Percy Jackson has a letter on his wrist, everyone freaks out.

"But it's not even a soulmate mark," Percy says to his cousins, chewing on his waffle. "It's literally a tattoo I got from a pretty shady guy for my mom."

Jason snorts. "Except now, every girl or questioning guy whose name starts with an 's', is freaking out. I heard that some girl in Louisiana got a tattoo of the letter 'p', but Aphrodite called her out on her show because it was on the wrong wrist."

Percy feels bad for her. "Think I should call her? Give her a high-five? That was a pretty weird thing to do and now she has a tattoo of the letter 'p' on her right wrist for no reason."

Nico shrugs and joins Jason on the couch. "I think you should leave her alone. If you visit one girl for getting a tattoo, what'd you think everyone else will do? Not get a tattoo on the wrong wrist? Highly unlikely. They'll all expect you to visit them, then when you don't, 'cause that's impossible and asking for a lot, everyone will hate you."

Percy nods into his waffle. He sees Nico steal the remote from Jason and turn the channel to Aphrodite's talk show.

Aphrodite is sitting in a bright pink chair at a blue table with a yellow backdrop, the logo for her show in the corner of the screen. She smiles sickly sweet. "Reports show from a group of teens who interviewed Mr. Jackson just this morning at a small diner attached to the apartments. They say that though Jackson did deny the mark on his arm for his soulmate, those of us out here can only hope he's lying." Aphrodite throws a hinting smirk at the camera, before delving further into the story.

Jason turns around on the couch to face him. "Did a bunch of kids really harass you about your tattoo while you were getting waffles?"

Percy nods, chewing on a piece of said waffle. "That's why it took so long."

They turn back to the t.v..

Aphrodite continues on about Percy. "For those wondering, Percy's possible soulmate mark is the first letter of the first name of his soulmate on his left wrist, so any of you out there who's name starts with an S, you could be a possible candidate." She grins, her pink lips stretching across her face. "Now, here's a picture of Jackson's possible soulmate mark that the teens who offered the story managed to snag." A picture covers the entire screen, it's of Percy's wrist, his torso and a part of his face. He's looking away from the camera, probably at the counter again, but what made Percy (in real time) almost drop his waffle, is what was on his wrist.

Not only the 'S' is visible in the picture, but also the ' _maybe today…_ ' part of what his soulmate wrote in clearly not his own handwriting. Jason and Nico pause, staring at the telly.

Aphrodite's gleaming face shows up on the screen again. "What we could only presume from the picture is that perhaps Mr. Jackson is hiding something from the public eye. That small bit of handwriting on his arm just above the tattoo could be something written by his girl, who may or may not be rooming with him in The Dakota apartments." She winks, "Now, onto our next segment: What Movie Will Meryl Streep Own Next!?. Because we all know she's the movie quee-"

Nico shuts the t.v. off. The two cousins look back at Percy who nibbles on his waffle. "Are you in a secret relationship? 'Cause, it's rude that you wouldn't tell us. We tell you everything."

"No," Percy denies, putting his waffle in his lap. "I'm not in a secret relationship. Not even a bit."

"Then what was that writing on your arm? We all know your handwriting sucks compared to that," Jason raises his eyebrow.

Percy sighs and stands from the barstools. He puts the waffle on the bag as a plate on the kitchen island and turns to his cousins. He makes a huge show of pulling up his sleeve to show them his arm. The two stand and scurry, crowding around his wrist like the teenagers once did about an hour ago.

And just above his healing tattoo is the words he had written not fifteen minutes ago. Except they're fading strangely. Percy realizes that his soulmate must be washing off his words to make room for her own. He wonders if she's doing it in the bathroom sink, or the shower. He tries to throw the thought away.

Suddenly, though, little letters start blooming on his arm like growing flowers, appearing in a trance-like way. The three boys watch in wonder as the sentence appears: _fun fact: they do have full body tattoos. There's actually a guy out there who is 100% covered in tattoos. His name is Lucky Diamond Rich, you should look him up. He juggles so maybe that's a thought for your next birthday party?_

It's so long and it covers his entire arm, but it's so cool and so weird. Percy wants to find his sharpie and respond _now_. But-

"That has to be the grossest but coolest thing I've ever seen ever," Nico walks back to the couch and flops down, taking up the entire space.

"What was that, Percy?" Jason asks.

"My actual soulmate."

Nico stands back up again. "You mean the one who completely turned deaf ear on you in middle school? You're talking to her? Why?"

Percy shrugs. "She started talking to me first. Plus I kinda felt bad about the tattoo thing, so there's that. Also, it was high school."

"Wait," Jason interrupts, putting his hand up. "How long have you been talking to her?"

Percy shrugs again and goes back to his waffle. "'Bout a day and a half."

Jason cringes. "And you're still talking about tattoos?"

Percy finishes his waffle and walks around the island to throw it away. "I mean, yeah, but the exchanges are few and far in between, so we'll get somewhere eventually."

"What's her name?" Nico asks, laying back down on the couch.

Washing his hands in the sink, he says, "I dunno. Like I said, we've only really talked about tattoos and seven years ago, we swore for some stupid reason not to tell each other our names."

"Why would you do that?" Jason asks.

"Mystery? I guess." Percy watches as his incredibly immature adult cousins wrestle over the t.v. remote. "I'm going out for lunch with my mom, bye."

Jason holds the remote above his head, out of Nico's reach. "Tell her I love her!"

Nico kicks the back of Jason's knees and grabs the remote when he doubles over. "Yeah, me too!"

Percy grabs the sharpie from his desk before he leaves.

* * *

" _There are many things I'd like to say to you, but I don't know how." -_ _Unknown_

Annabeth sits in the old, uncomfortable, plastic chair in the waiting room for her dentists office. She holds her book bag in her lap and absentmindedly drums a pattern with the pen she holds on her bag. Only an amount of time ago, she had to fill out paperwork and she accidentally didn't give the pen back.

She glances around, seeing the fish swim in the glass beside her head. She folds and unfolds her legs, it's disagreeably cold in the room and she hadn't worn enough layers. The only other person in the room is a middle-aged man reading a golf magazine and the receptionist who scribbles down notes on a pad of paper every few moments, stealing glances at her computer and the clock in the corner of the room.

Annabeth checks the watch on her wrist. Her appointment should've started twenty-five minutes ago, but Timothy, an eleven-year-old with a lisp, chipped his tooth on the playground and required the only doctors immediate attention. Ergo, Annabeth has to wait.

She allows her mind to wander, perhaps her soulmate has written back. She lifts her jacket sleeve up and sees a blank arm, but in small handwriting, right up by her inner elbow, it reads: _im bored_

She writes under it: _hi Bored, I'm Annabeth_.

Wait-

She mentally slaps herself.

The rule has been since they were in middle school: never tell names. Too late for that, she thinks.

His writing appears on her arm: _Annabeth, huh. I always thought you were more of a Martha._

 _As in Martha Stewart? Not likely._

 _Martha Stewart is a talented woman._

 _What's your name then?_

 _My name is Bored, I already said._

Annabeth rolls her eyes, then writes: _fine then, why are you so bored?_

 _I'm on a long bus ride to my moms flat. There's nothing to do._

 _Momma's boy, huh?_

 _You have no idea._

She isn't sure what next to write, so she starts doodling a pretty crappy looking flower on the back of her hand. Soon enough, when she has one petal left, it draws itself. Annabeth smiles. It's very obvious because her petals are thin ink and his is thick marker. She starts adding little dots in the middle part because people always seem to do that. Then she adds a stem. Her soulmate adds leaves. Annabeth admires their work, it doesn't look half-bad, considering half of it is in pen and the other a sharpie.

 _20 questions?_ , is what he writes next, under the previous conversation.

 _I'm not sure we have enough room for that._

He writes, _favourite colour?_

 _Blue_ , she writes immediately.

 _Good choice_ , he puts, _what's the story of your first kiss?_

 _Strange question_.

 _Im curious_

 _I fell down on the playground in second grade and this boy from my class picked me up, then I just kissed him because I didn't know it wasn't acceptable._

 _Did you ever date him?_

 _Through high school._

Annabeth realizes she made a mistake.

 _That's why you stopped talking to me,_ he writes.

 _It felt like I was cheating, I'm sorry. It was petty and stupid._

She has a feeling that if he was in front of her, he'd shrug. _It's fine, I had a grudge against you for awhile, but it's old news now._

She adds another leaf to the flower on her hand.

Though, he writes: _Do you think aliens exist?_

 _Yes,_ she says. _I think they're watching us right now. Waiting for the right moment to attack._

 _What's your favourite physical feature of the person next to you?_

 _I'm officially questioning your sanity._

 _I got these questions off of BuzzFeed._

 _Hmm,_ she writes, _maybe it's the fact that he can so easily turn the pages on his golf magazine, or perhaps his bifocals? I can't decide._

He doesn't say anything for a moment. _I laughed out loud and now everyone on the bus thinks I'm crazy, laughing at my own arm._

 _Glad to see someone thinks I'm funny. My roommate will laugh_ at _me if I try to make a joke._

 _Sounds like my cousins,_ he writes. _Where are you, by the way? I already told you I'm on the bus, so don't point fingers. Or pens._

Annabeth holds back a snort. _The dentist's office. I swear, if this Timothy kid doesn't come out of the appointment room in the next ten minutes, I'll fix his chipped tooth myself._

 _That's … terrifying. Now it's your turn to ask me questions._

 _What do you look like?_ She absentmindedly starts doodling another flower, this time on her knee. Annabeth figures he won't see it until later, but since she's wearing shorts, she can hold the satisfaction until later.

, is what he only wrote.

 _I told you my name, plus, I'm curious._

 _I have black hair_ , he writes, _green eyes, and I'm about average height._

 _Riveting_ , Annabeth writes, smirking. She wonders how handsome he'll be in person.

 _I just rolled my eyes, but you can't see,_ he writes.

 _Do you live in America?_

 _Very personal questions,_ he writes, _Yes, I live in New York, actually._

 _! me too_ , she excitedly tucks a strand of hair behind her ear.

"Annabeth Chase? The doctors ready for you."

Annabeth looks up and sees a nurse standing in the doorway, holding it open for her. She glances at the exit door and sees Timothy happily licking a lollipop, though tears stream down his face. Annabeth smiles at the nurse. "One second, please."

Before she can take a glance at what Percy is writing, Annabeth writes: _sorry, got to go, Timothy survived and now I'm due._

She pockets her pen and follows the nurse in for her checkup, rolling her sleeves up to her knuckles.

* * *

" _The only good thing about hitting rock bottom is that it can't get any worse." -U_ _nknown_

Percy doesn't really now how to feel.

First off, he finds out that his soulmates name is _Annabeth_ which has to be the bestest name he's ever heard. Next, he finds out that Annabeth lives in New York, and has a pretty wicked sense of humor because she didn't actually get offended by his 'Martha' comment, but instead made a joke about it. (Also the one about the guy with a golf magazine and bifocals.)

Actually, he never thought of her as a 'Martha'. He never really gave her a name. But he knows that Annabeth is better than anything he could come up with.

And to top all of his new findings, she leaves before he could finish writing his sentence. He understands what happened, though. Timothy finished getting whatever happened to him fixed and then Annabeth was called and had to go in. Percy doesn't blame her.

But the twenty minutes left of his bus ride were boring.

There was a couple groping each other madly in the front, a guy with an actual chicken in a cage, and a hand-full of crying babies.

But then the bus finally came to his stop and Percy got off, starting his walk to his mom's building. When he walks in, the whole apartment smells like coffee and fresh air. It became a habit of Sally's. When she would get home after being in a stuffy hospital for a week or so, she'd open all the windows and enjoy the fresh air. Percy figures that after her last visit to the hospital, she'd never close her windows again.

She greets him with a big hug and a kiss on the cheek, just like she always does. Then, for a few hours, Percy makes sandwiches with his mom. They eat the ones they made first, then make a bunch more so the upcoming Sunday, Sally can drop them off at the church.

Afterward, they make cookies, chocolate-chip-blue cookies, actually. An original recipe his mother and he came up with when Percy was younger.

As Sally and Percy sit at the dining table together, the smell of cookies and outside all around them, she finally decides to get something off her chest. "Percy," she says in a tone that Percy knows will soon send a dagger in his heart. "As you know, I have two months left." Her voice is soft and fragile. She's being wonderfully kind to Percy, because he feels like he's going to throw up.

He puts down his cookie, but doesn't meet her eyes.

"You know what a bucket-list is?" she asks.

"Yeah," he says. "It's a list of things you want to do before you die." He, in fact, wants to die talking about this.

His mom wipes her hands on her napkin again, though she had already done it just a minute ago. "Well, I have one thing left on my bucket-list."

 _Nonononononononononono._

"What is it?"

 _Please. No._

"I'm going to Greece, Percy."

He looks up, meeting her eyes. Sally's beautiful sky-blue eyes glisten with unshed tears. Percy doesn't understand. "You're wha- you're going to Greece?"

She sniffles. "It's where your father and I met. I want to go back there." Her voice catches. "It's where I want to die, sweetheart," she whispers.

She says it as if she's telling him about how she's thinking of filing a divorce against his father, except when she did that, she was crying harder. She has the same tone of informativeness, she knows it's important and she has to tell him, yet also disappointment, mostly in herself.

Percy really doesn't understand. Though, he feels tears sting his eyes.

 _No, please, don't cry in front of her._

"You want to go to Greece, and just leave me here? Mom-why?"

"Percy, it's where I want to-"

"Die, I know, you said." It comes out harsher than he intends. "I'm sorry. I-I just don't- understand." He really doesn't.

Sally wipes her eyes with her folded napkin. She places it down and thinks for a moment, then she reaches across the table and grabs Percy's hands. She looks into his eyes as she says, "Greece is where my life began, Percy. It's where I met my soulmate, where I became pregnant with you, it's where you were born. It's the beginning of everything I love, sweetheart, and I want it to be the end as well."

He's silent for a moment.

He knows the story; his mother had been telling him of her life since he was a child. She went on a trip to Greece with her Traveling Arts Club in high school. There, she met a sailor who showed her around. There, she fell in love. There, she got pregnant. But, as Sally would say in a low, excited voice when she would tell Percy the story, she didn't know, and she went back to Long Island, back to school. She found out she was pregnant just before graduation, so, taking all of her college money, she flew back to Greece after she earned her diploma and found her love again. She gave birth to a son who resembled his father more than anything. Then the three moved to New York, the adults got jobs, they got a small apartment where they raised their son to be who he is today.

Though, when Percy was eleven, his father showed around the house less often. Months he'd be gone. Then Sally sat Percy down at this exact table, in this exact position and told him his parents would be going on a break. A divorce, more like it.

"When—When will you leave?" Percy manages to get out.

She smiles sadly. "In one month, I've booked my ticket already." She smiles excitedly, "First class."

Percy smiles for his mom and squeezes her hand. She may have two months, but Percy only has one. "I'm happy for you, mom," he says truthfully, "but I-I just don't-"

"I know, Percy," she says, "I know." And for the first time since his parents split, Sally cries in front of Percy.

And it takes everything in him not to do the same.

* * *

 **hello hello there**

 **{before you go on, this authors note is probably going to be vv long}**

 **you guys, i mashed three seperate chapters together to give you this long number. the different chapters would've been where each quote is, and omg you guys. i felt like each upload, the chapters were just too short and few between so this story might not be 20 chapters, but the chapters themselves will be longer. (thumbs up!)**

 **Ahhhhhh! first of all: percabeth! r u kidding me?**

 **second of all: sally? going? to? greece? how is our seaweed brain going to deal w that one you guys. i just don't know. well i do, but you're gonna have to figure that one out.**

 **i'm going to do something that i have never done before: review responses! why? I don't know! i feeeeel like it**

 **I Am Definitely Jeff Bridges:** I absolutely love all the ways you're contriving to stop them realising they're each other's soulmates (though I'm beginning to wonder how long you can keep it up!) Looking forward to the next chapter, as always! **: i know right! when I was writing this, i just knew my readers would be quite frustrated about that, and as evil as it may be, i'm just over here in my fancy spinny chair, evil laughing as i read my prewritten chapters. Thank you so much for reading and reviewing, your responses always bring a smile to my face. -Leigh**

 **Happiness needs a refill:** Great chapter as always, pls continue the good work. And ,I NEED MORE THIS IS SOO GOOD, hope you have a nice day. **: hopefully this is a good length chapter! idk what i was thinking when I origionally numbered them. Thank you so much for reading and reviewing, I hope you have a wonderful day! - Leigh**

 **The Patil Twins:** loved it **: you're honestly so sweet lol, you always review even if it's just a short, two worded review. Every chapter I upload I know you're gonna comment and I love it. SO THANK YOUU! I hope you have a good day (or evening!) -Leigh**

 **IAmHelenOfTroy:** OOOOOOOOO PIPERRRRRRR OOOOOOO lol sorry, im fangirling over a fanfic lol **: there is NO SHAME in fangirling over fanfic lol. (sometimes i fangirl over my own stories yikes) I LOVE YOU GIRL THANK YOU FOR BEING AMAZING. HAVE A FANTASTIC DAY. -Leigh xox**

 **unicorn horn power:** I love it, i love it all **: i love you, i love you all. but seriously thank you, and also you have an awesome username. have a great day! -Leigh**

 **Percabeth284:** Yes! I love this story so much! Can't wait for the next chapter! **: thank you! i feel like i can always count on seeing your username in the reviews and it always brings such a smile to my face. i hope you're still loving this story and i also hope you have a great day. (beautiful username btw? fantastic) -Leigh**

 **Savanna:** OMG! I love that you are gonna make Piper and Jason get together even though they are not soulmates. It is great and you are an amazing writer. You should totally continue! :-p **: thank you so much! (when i was writing this i was like"... how to make the sweetest relationship possible?" and tada: non-soulmates but still together Jason and Piper was born. and they are flourishing. Thank you so much for the compliments and i hope you have a fantastic day! -Leigh**

 **righty-o ladies and gents that's all the reviews to respond to! (at least for last chapter) tell me! what do you think is gonna happen next? how will percaeth finally come to be? what about jiper? and what's going on with sally going to greece? who knows.**

 **i hope you all have an amazing weekend and rest up for next week! I larb you.**

 **(if you get that reference you are now my wife or husband or neutral significant other because it's 2018 and we support _everyone_ in this fandom let's gooo!) **

**\- Leigh**


	10. Chapter 10

_Chapter Ten_

 _"There are friends, there is family, and then there are friends who become family."_

 _Unknown_

* * *

Annabeth doesn't have cavities, so she takes this as an opportunity to buy a ton of ice cream and rent really lame movies from RedBox.

Piper isn't texting her, so Annabeth takes the time she spends in the cab looking over her conversations with her soulmate. Bored, is what she can only call him, since he refused to give her his name. Smiling, Annabeth takes out her pen and writes: guess who doesn't have cavities! I'm going to eat so much ice cream!

She doesn't expect him to respond right away, she does recall him saying he's going to his mom's, so she caps her pen and rolls down her sleeve, and watches the sun go down behind the bustling city of New York.

When Annabeth gets to the apartment, she washes her hands, and puts the movie in on the t.v., then she opens the ice cream and gets two spoons. Annabeth sits on the couch and leans back, resting her aching muscles. She reveles in the quietness for a moment.

Piper comes out of her room and instantly, the entire flat smells like vanilla. "What're you so dressed up for?" Annabeth asks, eyeing Pipers sleek black dress. It's the uber-fancy one she bought for only special occasions. It's soft like silk, yet is effervescent like velvet, and falls to her knees, the straps are literally diamonds, and the whole thing makes Piper look like she's going to the Grammys. Especially the carefully updone hair and sparkly makeup. Is that lipgloss? "Another date with the soulmate?"

"Nice poem," Piper smirks. She walks to the mirror near the door and examines her reflection. "Though, it's not Dean." Piper turns dramatically to her friend and grins. "I'm going on a date with Jason from down the hall."

Annabeth is really happy for her friend, but she can't help but wonder when Dean will turn up to give Piper the flowers. "That's great," Annabeth says, "but I bought ice cream. And RedBox, I thought we could have a girls night." Annabeth smiles widely, showing off her teeth. "See, I don't have cavities."

Piper walks back to her room and comes back with her clutch, a small handheld bag that matches the diamonds on her dress, she really looks like a model now. Minus the fact that she's not wearing shoes. "Annabeth, it's only-" she checks the microwave clock "-six twenty-seven. I'll only be gone a couple of hours. I swear, I'll be back before eleven, and then we can stay up late, watching movies and eating ice cream. As a matter of fact, my classes are canceled tomorrow, because isn't there supposed to be some massive blizzard or something? Anyway, we can stay up all late and watch the sunrise and that poetic stuff. You can survive until then."

The deal is actually really great so Annabeth bites her tongue. Though what she'll do if Dean shows up is beyond her. "Okay. I hope you have fun. Also don't kiss him. You look classy as hell, so act like it."

Piper smiles and stops rushing around the apartment. She winks, "I do look classy, don't I? Also, where are those cute strappy sandals you wore to your book release? They'll match my dress wonderfully."

The shoes are shoved in the back of Annabeth's closet, since she knows she'll never wear them again. But, as Piper said, they match her dress wonderfully. Just like the clutch, the shoes are the same studded diamond as the straps of her dress. "You look like a famous model going to the Grammy's or something."

Piper smiles, her cheeks lighting up pink. "Same goes for you, Annie."

They walk back into the living room and sit on the couch, waiting for Jason to show. "Seriously Pipes," Annabeth says, licking the ice cream off her spoon, "Jason'll melt faster than this ice cream is when he sees you."

Piper laughs. "I'm sure you're soulmate will do the same if he could see you right now."

"Oh!" Annabeth says, putting the spoon down on a napkin which sat on the coffee table. "Speaking of soulmates.." She looks down at her arm, though there's nothing new. "Maybe he'll say something by tomorrow."

"Holy crap, Annabeth," Piper says in shock, grabbing her wrist and looking at all the ink that lay on it. "How long did you talk to him? And when? Weren't you at the dentist?" Annabeth watches in amusement as Piper read the writings uber-fast. Piper slaps Annabeth's wrist.

"Ow!" She pulls her wrist back. "That hurt!"

Piper frowns at her. "Number one rule: don't tell him your name. Why would you break that rule?"

Annabeth holds her wrist and laughs. "Piper, we're adults, not middle schoolers anymore. It's time we get over that."

Piper softens. "Well, then. What's his name?"

Annabeth holds out her wrist in shame. "He didn't tell me." Piper slaps her wrist again before reading on. "You slap too hard for a normal person."

Piper shrugs. "I've had too much practice slapping people for a normal person."

Annabeth is not sure what that means.

"Awe, Annie, you two are so cute!" Piper turns her hand over. She pauses and looks up at Annabeth with a 'you've got to be kidding me this is so adorable' look. "You drew a flower together. God, you guys are practically married already. Despite the fact that you don't know his name."

Annabeth rolls her eyes and turns her wrist over. "Piper! Now my wrist is red."

"So? Put some cream on it, you'll be fine."

"His wrist will be red also. God, he'll think I live in a orphanage where they slap wrists as punishment."

"Well," Piper jokes. "Your name is Annie."

"If you didn't look so beautiful and put together right now, I'd slap you in your face."

There's a knock at the door. Piper grins. "Saved by the bell."

"It was a knock," Annabeth corrects as Piper goes to answer it.

Without checking her reflection, Piper takes a deep breath and opens the door with a smile. To this, Annabeth raises an amused eyebrow. "Hi, Jason!"

Annabeth can't see Jason, the kitchen wall just blocks him off, but she hears him chuckle. "Evening, Piper, you look lovely."

"Jason," Piper says, putting a hand over her heart. "You flatter me. Also, you do clean up well yourself."

Annabeth holds back a snort, but rolls her eyes instead.

"Shall we?" She hears Jason ask. Piper grabs his hand and as the door closes, Piper sends Annabeth one last massive grin and a thumbs up before it shuts completely, leaving Annabeth alone.

"Alright, Aphrodite," Annabeth says, picking up the remote and turning the t.v. on, "looks like it's just you and me tonight."

"Hello my lovely viewers," Aphrodite says brightly. "Welcome everyone who watches at home on their couches, surrounded by friends, more than friends," she winks, "and family-"

Annabeth shuts off Aphrodite and turns on the RedBox disc. "Alright, Meryl, looks like it's just you and me tonight."

* * *

Percy gets home late, just late enough for it to be dark outside, but early enough to catch Jason before he goes on a date with 'the love of his life'.

The bus ride home had to be the most exhausting thing he's ever done. And he competed in the freaking Olympics.

His mind decided, the whole ride, to replay every second of the last conversation he had with his mom over and over again, each time showing him how she cried and sobbed in his arms. He almost threw up all over the chicken guy, but held it back.

And now he's back at the apartment, watching as Jason paces back and forth. "God, what will I say. I can't be stupid-"

"Jason," Nico says from where he sits on the kitchen counter. "Just go with the whole 'you look hot, let's boogie?' thing that everyone does and move on with your life. Your pacing is getting on my nerves."

"You can't help me with this, Nico, you're gay."

Percy looks at Nico and raises an eyebrow. Nico shrugs. "He has a point. Also, I got some movies from Walgreens. You up for watching some? Also popcorn and Will is coming over."

Will is Nico's soulmate. Nico has the fun 'never seeing color until you meet your soulmate' kinda deal. Nico claims Will 'brought light into his life' which isn't too far off from what happened. They met at college because Nico actually goes to one of those. Will tutored him in math. Nico was a bit shocked when he found out he was gay, but he loves Will, so he recovered quite quickly.

"Sure," Percy says. Him and Will are actually really good friends.

Jason mutters to himself like a mantra: "Evening, Piper, you look lovely. Shall we? Evening, Piper, you look lovely. Shall we?"

Nico throws his hands up. "That is exactly what I said."

Jason stares at him. "Except it's more formal." Jason starts his mantra again.

He wears a suit with a black tie, and dare Percy say, Jason actually looks nice. He combed his hair and everything.

"Jason, you look rather dashing for a dinner date," says Will, who literally appears out of nowhere.

Jason gives him a shaky smile. "Hi, Will. Also, it's not just a dinner date. I'm taking her to

L'endroit Chic."

"L'endroit Chic," Nico repeats in surprise. Will hops up on the counter with him and greets his boyfriend with a kiss on his cheek.

"Dude, that's a really fancy place," Percy points out.

"I know." Jason looks like he's going to pass out.

"And it's, like, the most expensive restaurant in this part of town."

"I know."

"How're you going to pay for it?"

"I got a job."

Nico frowns. "I thought you already had one of those."

Jason works as a waiter at a friendly diner. "No," the blonde fancy one says. "I got another one. At that super huge architecture company, I work as a water boy, pretty much."

"You give water to everyone on the bench … at an architectural firm?" Will asks, slinging his arm over Nico's shoulders.

"No, I bring coffee and file papers."

"So, you're a secretary," Nico grins.

Jason's only response is to say, "Evening, Piper, you look lovely. Shall we?"

Will glances at the microwave. "Jason, you should go now. It's six thirty."

"Shit," Jason runs without closing the door.

"Let's watch this unfold," Nico slides off the counter and the other two follow him.

They all duck their heads out of the door and watch as Jason knocks nervously. The door opens and they hear a sweet voice say, "Hi, Jason!"

Jason chuckles, though Percy swears he sees him sweating. "Evening, Piper, you look lovely."

"Oh my god," Nico whispers. "The idiot actually said it."

Piper says something that they can't hear and Jason says, "Shall we?" holding out his hand.

"I swear," Nico whispers again, "I'd slap him if he wasn't so anxious about this."

Percy sees Jason lead Piper out, though Piper actually closes the door. But before she shuts it, she sends a thumbs up at whoever is looking. Percy connects that it's the roommate Jason helped with her groceries and Nico played Mythomagic with. He wonders for a moment what she'd be doing tonight.

The three go back into the apartment. Will closes and locks the door because he knows neither Nico nor Percy will do it. They migrate to the couch and Nico turns it on. "Okay," he says, pulling a blanket over his legs. "I got every remotely scary movie the Walgreens had, so let's not sleep. Shall we?"

Will snorts. "You sound like Jason."

Nico winks. "Well, you do look lovely this evening, Piper."

Percy says "You know? I think I'm gonna call it a night actually. I had a long day, with the waffles and harassing teenagers and all. You two enjoy your movies."

"Night, Percy," Nico calls. Percy can tell from his tone that he understands. Something happened at his mom's and he'll want to talk about it later.

"Don't let the bed bugs-ow! That hurt."

Before Percy sleeps, he takes a shower, washing the events from his overly long day off. Though, he doesn't wash off the ink, he wants to read that later.

After showering and getting into his pajamas, he sits at his desk and pulls the sharpie marker from his jacket which laid over his chair. He looks at the ink that says: _guess who doesn't have cavities! I'm going to eat so much ice cream!_

 _What flavour ice cream is my only question_ , he writes

Something on his wrist catches his attention. He turns on his desk lamp and sees that right on his wrist is a very red hand mark.

But she's already written back: _plain vanilla_

 _That's boring_

 _You're Boring._

 _Why do you have a handprint on your wrist?_ Percy figures that being bold is the best way to go.

 _That's just my roommate. She knows i've been writing to you and since we've been friends since I was eight, she knows about the 'no names' rule, so she got pretty pissed when she realized I didn't get your name. Not that she's abusive or anything. It was purely just fun. Only, she's a lot stronger than she realizes._

Percy reads it twice then goes to the bathroom and washes all the ink off so he has more room, after he writes: _you have a sweet roommate, mine are just my cousins and they're pretty lame. Also, I can't tell you my name._

 _Why not? The suspense is killing me._

 _If I told you, you'd probably know who I am._ He figures that everyone on the planet watches Aphrodite's channel, so she must be up to date with everything Percy Jackson is up to.

 _Famous much?_

 _For all the wrong reasons._

 _Why? You haven't murdered someone have you?_

 _No, there's just a lot of drama and conspiracies surrounding my name. I think you'd know if i killed someone._

 _Ahh, so you're really famous. Got it._

 _I'm rolling my eyes at you right now._

So, Annabeth writes (he really loves her name), _you live in New York, you're uber famous. Ryan Gosling?_

 _a) no, i'm not ryan gosling 2) where did ryan gosling come from?_

 _I don't know, Ryan literally lives in the apartment above me, that would be very convenient if you were him._

 _You live in the same building as Ryan Gosling? And you're on first name terms with him? The only interesting people who live in my apartment is this really old couple who golf in the hallways on holidays._

 _That's … odd._

Percy checks the clock. 10:47. He must've been in the shower for longer than he realized.

 _I'm all tired and stuff. Write you later?_

 _That was cheesy, Goodnight, soulmate._

 _Night, Annabeth._

 _Not fair._

He caps his marker and puts it in his jacket pocket again. Then, because his room smells strongly of sharpie marker and pen ink, Percy opens the window, allowing the fresh air and New York City street noise to drown out the sounds of screams coming from the t.v. in the living room.

Percy sleeps with no dreams, but the smell of peaches hijack his imagination.

* * *

Annabeth is in the middle of an episode of The Fosters (which she doesn't really like, but she watches it anyway because she's bored), when there's a knock at the door. It's not Piper, because she would just barge in, and it's only nine forty-one, so Annabeth blanks before realizing.

Dean smiles at her crookedly before asking, "Is Piper in?"

Annabeth's knee-jerk response is to say, "Yes, but she's terribly sick. Super contagious. It's awful."

Dean frowns. "Could I see her? I would like to make sure she's okay.."

"No," Annabeth closes the door a bit more so he can't get in or see in. "Sorry, but she's so contagious, you might get sick by even going in."

"Well, then why are you in there? Aren't you going to get sick, too?" Dean's voice is so sincere she feels her heart break for lying to him.

"Well, no, because I passed the sickness to her." She almost blows her cover and cringes at her own excuse.

"But you didn't seem sick at the store this morning." A web of lies is what she's stringing, as if she's some giant, lying spider. Shiver, spiders.

"Well, I was sick when you two went out last night, and when Piper got back from your date, we talked for a while and I accidentally got her sick."

"Oh," he says, looking down solemnly to his toes for a minute. "Well, could you give these to Piper for me?" He pulls out a huge bouquet of different coloured roses that caused Annabeth so much trouble earlier in the day. "And tell her I hope she gets better soon. I would like to take her out again." He smiles broadly.

Annabeth feels horrible.

"Of course, I'm sure she'll be delighted." Annabeth takes the flowers. "Have a lovely evening, Dean."

"You as well, Annabeth." He stalks down the hallway and disappears in an elevator.

Suddenly, before Annabeth can close the door, The Apartment's door opens (that's what Annabeth is calling Percy Jackson's apartment now), and Nico, the Mythomagic guy, comes out kissing a very tall, blonde kid. So, he is gay, Annabeth thinks, but not with Percy Jackson.

The blonde laughs and breaks the kiss, he says, "Gods, Nico, I really have to leave." Nico kisses his cheek. "You're a horrible drunk.."

Annabeth closes her door softly, hoping to not interrupt their moment. She goes back to the couch and watches the t.v. until her vision goes out of focus and everything becomes blobs of colour. Going on full boredom, Annabeth glances on her arm, and to her delight, his handwriting appears on her arm. Before he could finish, Annabeth goes to get her pen and responds.

For a while, they write and talk, until he retires to bed. She bids him a goodnight and welcomes the utter monotony that comes with an empty apartment.

She lays on the couch, staring up at her white ceiling. She thinks about him. She wonders what her black haired, green eyed, slightly famous soulmate is like. She wonders who his friends are and what his laugh sounds like. She wonders if he has a girlfriend and doesn't believe in soulmates, like Piper. She wonders what his voice will sound like and if he'll be taller than her. She wonders what he does in his free time. She wonders about him until Piper knocks on the door close to eleven.

Annabeth rolls her eyes because she knows Piper is continuing with her sweet and elegant facade. When she opens the door, Piper and Jason are both grinning at her like crazy animals. "Hey, Piper, Jason."

Piper keeps smiling creepily. Jason says, "It's nice seeing you, Anna-" his voice catches as his eyes travel down her body. "Annabeth, it's nice seeing you, Annabeth. And I had a good time, Piper."

Piper giggles. "I had a lovely time, too, Jason. I'll see you again?"

He nods and walks to his apartment. Piper rushes in, shoving Annabeth aside, closing the door and locking it. "Holy crap." Piper grabs Annabeth's hand and tears her to the couch. Her cheeks are flush from probably champagne or wine or excitement or anger; Annabeth can't tell at this point. "Remember when I said Dean was the best kiss I've ever had?"

Annabeth frowns. "I mean, I think you said something like that-"

"Well, I didn't even kiss Jason and holy crap, I'm in love with him, Annabeth." She laughs clearly as if she's found the cure for cancer. "I love him."

"Calm down, Piper, you met him this morning, you've had one date-"

"He's smart, Annabeth," Piper says almost sternly. "He's funny and probably the sweetest guy I've ever met. He didn't know, but I noticed that he wore two different socks and he kept running his hands through his hair and his eyes sparkle like the moon's reflection on a lake, and he has the bestest smile and a dimple on his right cheek. He loves his family, though it's kinda messed up. He lives with Percy Jackson and the emo kid, plot twist, they're all cousins, so they can't be gay. And he likes holding my hand, and he's so bad at flirting but he's so cute when he tries and god Annabeth, I love him."

The whole monologue was a lot so Annabeth says, "Nico, the emo one's gay. I saw him kissing his boyfriend good-bye earlier in the hall when-Oh! Piper, Dean came by."

Piper's entire spirit drops. "What?"

"He dropped off the flowers."

Panic flashed through her different eyes. "You didn't tell him I was on a date, did you?"

"No," Annabeth assures, "he thinks you're uber sick and overly contagious. Also, I gave you the sickness. It was right after you came back from your date with him."

She nods. "I'm sorry you had to lie. Where did you put the flowers?"

Annabeth shrugs. "They were pretty. I put them in a vase on the table."

Piper laughs. "Give me a minute to put on my pajamas, then we'll talk, eat what's left of the ice cream and watch movies or whatever. Okay?"

"Perfect."

Annabeth doesn't sleep much, instead, she watches the sunrise, eats too much ice cream, plays the "love me, love me not" game with every single flower from the bouquet until their balcony is covered with stems and flower petals, she laughs, and listens while her roommate babbles on and on about her blonde-eyed-beauty. She just lives for a while. She lives while everyone sleeps.

And she does it all with her sister at her side.

* * *

When Jason gets back to his apartment, Nico is laying on the couch, asleep, and Percy is nowhere to be found.

He tiptoes back to his room and as he gets ready for bed, he recalls everything that happened tonight.

Piper is definitely the love of his life, even if the mark on his chest says otherwise.

But what Jason really thinks about is Annabeth.

When she answered the door, Jason saw something on her wrist.

Writing, just like on Percy's arm.

And the letter 'S'; a tattoo.

Percy and Annabeth are soulmates. Huh, he thinks as he falls asleep, who would've thought?

* * *

 **hello hello there.**

 **this is, by far, my favorite chapter in the whole story**

 **evening, piper. shall we?**

 **i die.**

 **JASON KNOWS THEY'RE SOULMATES! CODE DOUBLE TRIPLE RED!**

 **ahhhh! tenth chapter! we're getting into our double digits now you guys! plus! we'll probably hit 100 reviews also! how exciting!**

 **thank you all in advance for all your support! i larb you all.**

 **speaking of reviews... review response time!**

 **(i'm not going to write your review anymore cause that takes up so much space and ups the word count like crazy, so i'm just gonna put your username)**

 **GirlishlyGreek: okay kat youRE KILLING ME. i burst out laughing when i first read your review and, of course, this caused quite a few heads to turn so now my family thinks i'm quite insane. bUT girl you are my number 1 fan (of course i'm yours also because you're amazing at everything? it's impeccable). and yes my new hobby is making you suffer, i've also taken up knitting. {also yes, they do take sandwiches to the church. sometimes the one near my house has collections where you can send in food and they make meals out of it and go around and give them to the homeless, it's neat. i just felt like sally would absolutely be apart of that} thank you and i love you and continue being an actual queen/ xox Leigh**

 **unicorn horn power: thank you for reviewing, and ik poseidon can be quite a douche sometimes. lol he's like rachel. not a horrible person in the books but everyone kinda makes them like that in fanfics. have a lovely day! -Leigh**

 **nihal27: thank you so much! you're too kind. thanks for reading and reviewing! have a great rest of your day! -Leigh**

 **AnnabethGinevraJacksonPotter: i? love? your? username? (lets not pretend like i listened to a very potter musical soundtrack earlier today...) thank you so much for the review! Tbh i love soulmate AUs so much also, I just knew I had to do one, and I'm glad you're enjoying it! have a great friday! -Leigh**

 **.art: you're too sweet with that. and yes, most of these chapters are prewritten, I maybe have eight more? so i need to get writing lol. thank you for reviewing and reading! Have a fantastic day! (also i did pm you back btw, im not sure if you saw it or not) -Leigh**

 **tmitrashtbh: ahhhh yes! i feel you! the thing with sally is so sad, it broke my heart writing about it. and Ahhhhh! i wish piper and jason could just be soulmates also! it tears my heart to pieces! i hope this chapter was a good consolation to that though. they went on quite a sweet date! thank you for reviewing and reading! i hope you have a wonderful day! -Leigh**

 **IAmHelenOfTroy: your responses honestly make me laugh and smile so much lol. THANK YOU FOR BEING YOU AND THATS AWESOME AND YOU'RE FANTASTIC AND I LUV YOU GIRLIE. okay have a great day now :) -Leigh**

 **ravenqueen162: I'm glad you loved it! i hope you enjoyed this chapter too! have a great day! -Leigh**

 **Percabeth824: Thank you so much for the read and review, you're too sweet honestly. the thing with sally always makes me so sad, but then again i am writing it? so... i guess i'm making myself sad? I'm glad you're liking the longer chapters, i think they're just gonna get longer so YAAy! Thank you for everything and have a great day! -Leigh**

 **The Patil Twins: YEs! I feel the same whenever I read a percy jackson fic. im like "ahh i should've thought of that first!" lol. Your review honestly brought such a smile to my face, you're the sweetest ever. I hope you enjoyed this chapter and I hope you have a wonderful day! -Leigh**

 **Tanu01: I larb your review huny, you're the nicest. tbh i'm real excited for the new year also. thank you for reading and reviewing, you're awesome and I hope you have an awesome day! -Leigh**

 **Guest (only one guest reviewed my last chapters so you know who you are ;)): THANK YOU SO MUCH? THATS' THE NICEST THING ANYONES EVER SAID? i don't think its the _best_ but then again, we're all too self-critical. Thanks for reading and reviewing, i hope you have a great day! -Leigh**

 **RestlessSoul100: eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeppppppppppppppppppppppppppp! thank you so much! lol have a great day! -Leigh**

 **WildYoungAndFree: Thank you so much for reading and reviewing! I hope you enjoyed this chapter and I hope you have a super day! -Leigh**

 **SisiphoWrites: Yes! I love their conversations so much! percabeth is my literal OTP im in love with both of them no joke. I'm so going to continue with this story and I hope you continue reading! thank you for reviewing and I hope you have a fabulous day! -Leigh**

 **wow that took quite a while.**

 **question.**

 **does anyone read all of the responses, or just scroll until you've found your username? or do you just go down until the rest of the authors note? (i always just look for my username lol)**

 **i've written this like a billion times and my fingers are getting sore, but thank you all for reading and responding, it means just the whole world to me and it makes my friday so much better so THANK YOU from the bottom of my heart! I LUV YOU ALL!**

 **okay have a grrrreat day!**

 **-Leigh**


	11. Chapter 11

_Chapter Eleven_

 _"Soulmates are muses. The people in your life you despise, disrespect, and desire the most."_

 _-Coco J. Ginger_

(line break)

Percy feels like Death.

He wakes up with an aching neck and an inclination that today will not be a very good one.

But he gets up anyway; grumbling and yawning and hissing at the light, but he's up nonetheless.

When he walks into the living room, Jason is leaning on the counter sipping a cup of coffee, and Nico sits on the couch, eating cereal and watching The News.

"God, Nico, why are you watching that so early?" Percy sits next to him, shoving his hair out of his eyes to see what Aphrodite has to offer them at seven in the morning.

"Now," the glittery show host says with a sickening smile. "As you all know, our favourite topic of discussion on our show here, right now, is Percy Jackson and the mysterious unknown tale of his soulmate."

Nico snorts. "Sounds like a fantasy novel."

Percy would smack the back of his head, but he's too tired to move, and he has a feeling that if he did, Nico would 'accidentally' pour his entire bowl of cereal all over Percy.

"Well, today, since we don't have much more information yet, we'll be doing a recap on everything we've learned." She clears her throat. "Percy Jackson is an Olympic swimmer with two silver medals and one gold in his possession, so as we all should know, Mr. Jackson has to show off a considerable amount of skin. But, something that has been neglected to show is his soulmate marks." A series of pictures show up of Percy at his swim meets, in not much clothing but a small speedo. Some pictures show him after competitions with a towel around his waist and his smiling cousins at his sides.

Nico yelps into his cereal. "Look, Jason! We're famous! Aphrodite knows who we are."

Jason glances up and sees a picture of the three of them posing after Percy won his gold medal. "Neat. Mom will be proud."

The screen goes back to Aphrodite's face and Nico shooshes Jason. "Well, we can certainly say that Percy has some attractive friends," she winks.

Nico chokes on his cereal.

Aphrodite continues. "Though, of course, our main concern is whether or not Percy Jackson has a soulmate. In rare cases, people are simply born without soulmates, or sometimes their soulmate dies and the mark fades. So that brings us to this, Percy Jackson, if you're watching, save us the dramatics, honey. Tell us about your soulmate." She flashes a smile and the channel changes to a car commercial.

Percy stands up and rubs the sleep from his eyes. "I certainly won't be doing that."

Jason shifts awkwardly in his position, putting his phone down and avoiding eye contact, he asks, "What did you say was your soulmates name, again?"

Percy makes a face at his cousin and digs through the fridge for the milk. "I didn't, actually. How did you know I know her name?"

Jason sips his coffee. "I guessed. So, what's her name?"

Nico snorts from the couch, "If you're trying to be inconspicuous about something, then I'll have you know, you're failing miserably."

Percy picks out some Frosted Flakes from the cupboard. Smiling, he says, "Her name is Annabeth."

It feels strange on his tongue, being the first time he's said it out loud, but he likes it more than any other name.

Jason smirks. "Nice name."

Percy frowns at his oddly acting cousin.

Nico, though, spits out his cereal. "Her name is Annabeth?"

Percy nods.

Nico throws his head back and laughs loudly. "That's awesome!"

Jason smirks.

Nico laughs.

Percy wants in on the joke.

He starts creating his cereal. Of course, the Frosted Flakes first, then milk. "What's so funny? Do you guys know someone named Annabeth?" He hopes the desperation in his voice isn't as desperate as it actually is.

Nico stops laughing, though he sniggers into his cereal. Jason shrugs and sips his coffee. "Maybe, sounds familiar. But then again, I've met a few people named Anna and Beth, so…"

Nico drinks the milk out of his cereal bowl and Percy has to look away so he doesn't throw up. "How was your date last night, Jason? I was asleep when you got back," Nico states. He puts the bowl on the coffee table and disappears from the cousins' sight as he lays down on the couch.

Jason snorts. "Yeah, I saw you asleep on the couch."

Nico rolls his eyes. "How was your date?"

Jason shrugs, an odd expression on his face. "It was nice."

Percy quirks an eyebrow. "Nice?"

He shrugs again. "Well, she's great, you know. Super smart and funny. Beautiful, too. The straps on her shoes, the diamonds on them, were falling off-"

"If you're gonna complain, don't even say anything," Nico interrupts.

Jason sighs. "It was perfect. She is perfect."

"But…" Percy prods.

"Reyna Ramirez."

Nico groans. "Forget about her, oh my god!"

Percy rolls his eyes and faces Jason. "So what about your soulmate?"

Jason, wide-eyes, gestures wildly, he bursts out: "Piper is not Reyna!"

"Obviously," Nico grumbles.

"She's not my soulmate."

"What does that matter, Jason?" Percy starts eating his cereal, fed up with Jason's inability to explain himself.

"You have to end up with your soulmate. It's honestly a lost cause if I just date Piper when the person who I'm made to be with is out there."

Nico sighs from the couch. "You're the lost cause here, Jason."

Percy sighs, putting his spoon down to face the blond. "Do you like Piper?"

Jason nods. "Yeah, a lot."

"How much?"

"A lot."

Percy sighs. "That's not what I was asking. Jason, how much do you like Piper?"

"Ten out of ten."

Nico laughs. "He's supposed to be in law school! God, Jason."

Percy rolls his eyes for probably the eighth time that morning. "How far do you want to take things with Piper?"

Jason sighs. He runs his hands through his hair and bows his head for a minute before looking up and saying, "After just the one date?" He laughs. "Gods, I wanna marry her."

(line break)

It's a Saturday, so Piper and Annabeth don't leave the apartment for anything.

They wake up on their small balcony outside. Annabeth feels positively hot because not only is she wearing sweatpants and a blanket, but for some reason, the sun beams down warmer than any other day in February.

Annabeth sets up The News as Piper gets coffee. Aphrodite recaps Percy Jackson's soulmate business and Piper playfully whistles when the pictures of him come up. Though, she swallows it when a picture of Jason, Percy, and Nico pops up. Piper sips her coffee and hums. "I would take one fully clothed Jason over a thousand almost naked Percy Jacksons anyday."

Then after Aphrodite finishes her small recap, the channel changes to a car commercial. "Do we have anything to do today?" Piper asks.

Annabeth leans back and thinks. She went grocery shopping the other day, work and classes don't start up again until Monday, so they don't have anything to do. Unless they decide to be productive and get the mail, but that's unlikely. Annabeth stays quiet, though, drinking in the atmosphere. Piper scrolls on her phone, the t.v. is muted during the commercial break, the entire apartment smells like early morning fresh air and rich coffee. The arm of the couch is uncomfortable as she lays on it, but she isn't bothered enough to move.

"No," Annabeth says, a content smile on her face, "we don't have anything to do today."

(line break)

Around noon, Annabeth gets a message from her soulmate.

Her and Piper are watching the end of Into the Woods because right after is yet another Harry Potter marathon and they aren't going to miss that for the world. They lay on the couch, each of their feet in the others lap, a blanket laying over it, and a bowl of hot popcorn on top of that, untouched. (They're saving it for the movie.)

 _You ever wonder if we've run into each other before?_

Annabeth frowns. She picks up the pen laying on the coffee table and responds: _Not until now._

She thinks. If they do live in New York, it's a possibility they've run into each other, though, with her luck, Annabeth highly doubts it. Her life isn't a cute, romantic love story.

 _What do you look like?_ , he asks. She writes him back, because she figures that it's only fair to tell him what she looks like since she knows what he looks like.

 _I have blonde hair. Grey eyes? I have no idea how tall I am, maybe an inch taller than average._

She writes small enough to leave space for his response, though none came.

Annabeth doesn't think much of it, he's probably busy, though he's acting a bit oddly.

(line break)

After the whole waffle-fiasco, Percy doesn't have the inspiration to leave the apartment. Both Jason and Nico had left hours ago for work, leaving Percy to fend for himself.

Percy goes into that state of boredom where everything that normally seems extremely interesting, is all of a sudden mind-numbing. He's not sure exactly what to do at this point, so he writes to his soulmate in his dark bedroom and eventually (and accidentally) falls asleep.

(line break)

 **hello hello there**

 **i feel so evil for this chapter and i'm not even sorry**

 **but i am very very very sorry because i can't do review responses this chapter, unfortunately this week has been very busy and last night i was turning in my history essay at 11pm and i thought that maybe? getting a little bit of sleep would be nice? so i apologize for that**

 **no worries, i will respond to all your reviews next chapter. pinky swear**

 **anyway**

 **things are heating up! jason knows, but didn't tell percy????? hmmmmmmmmmmm... and now nico knows too? whaaat?**

 **like i said i feel so evil for this chapter and you guys don't even know**

 **anyway have a great day!**

 **(that was a bit cynical wasn't it?)**

 **\- Leigh**


	12. Chapter 12

Chapter Twelve

" _We are fragile. Exploding like feathers from pillows of chaos."_

 _Christopher Poindexter_

* * *

It's almost a week later (it's Friday now) and Annabeth starts to worry.

She doesn't really know why she worries so much, but once upon a time a situation like this happened, but the roles were reversed. Plus, she knows they didn't end on a bad note, but yet, he hasn't written to her, or responded to her notes, in over a week.

So, she worries.

Annabeth doesn't allow herself to worry all the time, like when she's at work or hanging out with Piper, but when she's alone in bed, in her dark, dark room, the worry and agitated fear creeps into her mind. One night, in a fit of worry and slight rage, she draws a small circle on her hand then forces herself to sleep, hoping that maybe in the morning, he'll have drawn the petals on her flower.

But he doesn't, so she keeps worrying.

"Hey, Annabeth! Do you have a hair tie I can borrow?"

Annabeth looks up from the tray of cookie dough she's forming. Piper stands in the doorway to the kitchen, a braid only being held together by Piper's fingers in her hair, and a very casual outfit of jeans and a sweatshirt. "Uh, yeah," Annabeth says, taking the hair tie off her wrist and handing it to her friend. "Where are you going? I thought you didn't have classes on Tuesdays at three." Annabeth spoons more cookie dough and forms a ball, placing it on the cooking sheet and continuing her process.

"Yeah, buuut I'm going on a date, so….." Piper swipes forward and steals a finger-full of cookie dough.

Annabeth frowns. "A date? Wearing that? Not to be a fashion police or whatever, but last time you went on a date, you looked like a Grammy award winner. This is a bit of a step down."

Piper hums and smiles. "Jason and I are going to the movies, and then dinner after."

Annabeth almost laughs. After the mistake of Piper and Dean's movie date, she wasn't sure another one, even with a different guy, would be much better. "You sure, Pipes? After what happened at your last movie date?"

Piper rolls her eyes and sits on the counter next to Annabeth's cookie making station. "Nothing happened with Dean, which was why the date sucked. Nothing awful or amazing or anything. But I have a feeling with Jason it'll be different."

Annabeth smiles at her friend. "I like Jason. You have my approval to date him."

Piper snorts. "I need your approval?"

"Who else would do it?" Annabeth puts the cookies in the oven and sets the timer. "You know, the other day I was uber bored, and- Dean's last name is Phillips, right?"

Piper smiles confusedly. "Yeah, why?"

Annabeth laughs. "Phillips means lover of horses, just a fun fact."

Piper laughs, then shivers. "I don't know if I'd be able to rock Piper Phillips. Two 'p's are enough. Add another and I'm just a weirdo who likes alliterations too much."

Annabeth smiles slyly. "Well, what's Jason's last name?"

Piper smiles, trying to keep a grin down. "Piper Grace. Sounds like I'm a ballerina."

Annabeth laughs. "Hello there, Piper Grace, I am your lonely and single best friend, Annabeth Chase."

Piper smirks. "Not for long. That soulmate of yours sure seems wonderful."

Annabeth sits at the table and Piper hops down from the counter and does the same as her friend. "I don't think so," Annabeth sighs. "He's been ignoring me for a week."

Piper grabs her best friends hand. "He'll get over himself, I'm sure of it. I mean, who wouldn't want to be your soulmate?"

Annabeth smiles, and the doorbell rings. Piper gets up excitedly and exits the apartment to her date.

Twelve minutes later, Annabeth eats her cookies alone.

* * *

On Friday morning, Annabeth wakes up with almost _everything_ out of the ordinary.

First thing she notices, she's alone. Which is odd because every night for practically years Piper manages to slither into her bed, and waking up without a limb lodged in her back or stomach is a strange feeling.

She sorta feels … lonely.

Not only that, but her ankle hurts like she'd twisted it or sprained it somehow. For a moment she contemplates exactly what she'd done to hurt herself so badly, until she realizes it could only be the work of her soulmate.

After stretching her arms, twisting her back, and throwing her hair into a ponytail, she picks up her pen she left on her nightstand (yeah, she did _that_.) In the back of her mind, Annabeth wonders if he'll even respond. It's been almost a week and he hadn't even responded to her last message, the one about her appearance. Instead of wallowing, she writes: _how'd you injure us this time?_

She puts the pen down and starts her Friday.

Three minutes later, Annabeth enters the kitchen to see Piper dancing (more like bouncing erratically) around the kitchen while making coffee. "Have a good date last night?" Annabeth asks, an amused eyebrow raised. Even though Piper had left at three in the afternoon the day before for her movie date, she hadn't come home until after Annabeth went to bed.

Piper sighs uncharacteristically dreamy. "Yeah. We saw the movie, got pizza at this really amazing place I've never heard of. Oh my god, Annabeth, we stayed there and talked for hours, the staff had to kick us out." She smiles. "After that he took me to this twenty-four hour Dairy Queen - did you know those things existed? Cause I didn't - and we had milkshakes and talked even after that."

Annabeth sits at the table and watches her friend create her sugary coffee and tell her story.

"He drove me home, and Annabeth! You'll never believe what he did!" Piper grins so broadly that Annabeth can't help but grin too.

"What'd he do, Pipes?"

Piper bounces up and down and smiles so widely, her eyes close. Annabeth thinks she's going to explode.

And explode she does.

"He kissed me!" Piper practically yells. She starts doing her dance again, this time with more jumps, twirls, and pointed fingers.

Annabeth laughs and stands. "That's awesome, Piper! How was it? Everything you've dreamed of?"

Piper nods. "And more." Piper frantically grabs her coffee and Annabeth's hand. She leads Annabeth to the table and puts her coffee down.

Annabeth sits down with an amused smile at her wild friend.

"Okay," Piper says. "It was the _sweetest_ thing ever. He led me to the door, you know, holding my hand, asking me if I had a good time, then telling me he had a great time too. Ugh! And then we got to the door and he said, 'I wish it wasn't over so soon'," Annabeth chuckles at her friends imitation of Jason's deep voice, "And so I'm internally freaking out, but outside I'm cool and I agree, and then out of nowhere he kisses me." Piper smiles wistfully. "He tasted like chocolate and gum, and his lips were so soft-"

"Okay, Pipes," Annabeth interrupts. "I love you, and Jason sounds awesome, but I don't need all those details."

Piper keeps grinning like she's won a million dollars. "I know I sound like a schoolgirl, Annabeth, but he's so funny and sweet and, I mean, his phone kept going off but he turned it on silent and his socks didn't match again tonight, he ran his hands in his hair more times than necessary, he was always chewing a piece of gum except while we ate, he snorts when he laughs, he fiddled with his fingers when he got nervous and _god_ , Annabeth, he's the freaking best."

Annabeth chuckles. "It sounds like you've fallen quite hard, my dear." She sips Pipers coffee, making a sour face at the sugary taste and gets up to make her own bitter cup.

"I have, haven't I?" Piper chuckles. "Hey, why are you limping?"

Annabeth snorts and waits for her coffee to brew. "My soulmate did something stupid, probably. Unless it was Bianca."

Bianca is the ghost that haunts their apartment. In the 1940's, a family of four lived in their flat, Bianca, the youngest daughter, lived in the flat her whole life and died a solemn death when it was her time. The only creepy part is that she died _in the apartment_.

Piper chided her. "Stop, Bianca is a sweetheart, she wouldn't hurt you."

Piper claims this because once upon a long time ago, they didn't believe the whole Bianca story, but then Piper said "hey, thanks for recording Law and Order, I forgot to this week," which Annabeth denied ever doing so. Piper claimed Bianca somehow recorded her show and thus came the theory: Bianca is a sweetheart. Annabeth didn't object, she had no reason to. For all she knew, Bianca did record Law and Order for her.

Fifteen minutes later, Annabeth is in the lift, heading to the lobby with her shirt untucked, a bagel in her mouth, and Percy Jackson in swim shorts next to her.

She swears, as the elevator descends the amount of floors, that the Fates are messing with her. She can't tell whether or not it's good or bad, but for some reason, she keeps running into this guy.

Annabeth fumbles over herself, trying to eat her bagel mannerly while also trying not to make too much of a scene. The last thing she needs is this Olympic swimmer looking at her oddly while she tucks in her shirt, chomps on a bagel, and talks conspiracy theories with Piper over text. Finally getting her shirt the right way, her name tag facing forward and rightside up, she takes another bite of the grossly plain bagel and reads Piper's text.

 _Piper:_ wow, this is the 47 time youve run into him?

 _Piper:_ maybe its a sign

The elevators ding. He steps out first and Annabeth follows, just as last time, though, he goes to the pool and she heads for the doors.

 _Annabeth_ : a sign that im really unlucky?

 _Piper:_ unlucky? Running into a hot swimmer is unlucky to you?

 _Annabeth:_ shush it you have a boyfriend

 _Piper:_ stop texting me and get a freaking cab, ur gonna be late and leos going to fire you

 _Annabeth:_ love you too pipes

Annabeth pockets her phone and glances around for a moment. Typical, not one empty cab in sight. She waits for a couple of minutes before a yellow car stops for her. Trying not to show her irritation (she _is_ four minutes late to work already), she tells him the address and hopes her boss isn't too mad.

Luckily, he's not.

Well, he's not mad at her, per se. But he is mad.

Turns out, his girlfriend of three months had recently dumped him. He decided to take his anger out on his employees. Namely, Annabeth. Since she is the only person willing to work on a Friday at nine a.m..

Her boss, Max, a guy in his mid twenties who claims he has much better things to do than run a library, yet it's all he's ever done, welcomes Annabeth into the store with a list of things to do.

"Max," Annabeth interrupts his long speech, feeling a bit overwhelmed. "I only work until noon on Fridays. I can't do all this in three hours." Less than three, actually, since she arrived fifteen minutes late due to poor planning and awful traffic, but she doesn't mention it because Max hasn't seemed to notice yet.

He looks stressed. His hair in every direction, his normally okay-looking tie now askew, his shirt not tucked in, and his name tag only resting in his shirt pocket rather than pinned above it.

The pleading look in his eyes makes Annabeth want to curl up and disappear. "Please, Annabeth," he practically begs, "ask Leo to help you. I just need this stuff done before the inspectors come tomorrow, and I have so much paperwork, I can't help. Just try your best."

She hesitates but nods reluctantly. Annabeth isn't quite sure how much work could be done in three hours, especially if her only help is Leo, and if they have frequent customers.

Max straightens as if a weight has been lifted from his shoulders. "Thank you so much, Annabeth, you're the best." He runs off to his office without another word.

As Annabeth goes to the front desk to put her bag down, a head pops up from behind the counter. "Morning, Annie," Leo Valdez says cheerfully, a bright grin on his face, his curly hair bouncing everywhere.

Annabeth smiles. "My name is Annabeth."

Leo stands, but his smile doesn't falter. "And my name is _Leonidas_ , but nobody calls me that, do they?"

Annabeth puts her phone in her bag and walks to the break room, Leo following behind. "Yeah, but you introduce yourself as Leo, so everyone calls you that. I'm Annabeth, yet everyone takes it upon themselves to give me a nickname." She opens her locker and puts her bag in, then exits the room back to the front desk, Leo trailing behind the whole time.

"It's 'cause your name is so easy to make a nickname. Either Anna or Beth or Annie or Bethy. Honestly, the options are endless."

Annabeth rolls her eyes. She opens the register and sorts the coins back to their actual places because she knows the night-shifts never get their math right.

Leo leans on the desk, watching her. "So, Annabeth," he smiles, "what's on the agenda today?"

Annabeth goes to sorting the notes now, since, yet again, most of them are in the wrong place. "I don't know, _store manager_ , why don't you tell me?"

Leo raises an eyebrow in mischievous approval. "Sassy this morning, are we?"

She sighs. "I got only a sip of my coffee, a plain bagel, and practically a list of chores, I can be as sassy as I want."

"What do we have today, then?" he asks.

Annabeth thinks for a second. "We have to reorder the Twilight series, restock the nonfiction books, and mop the kids section. Also, wipe the stores front windows." She finishes with a sarcastically bitter smile.

Leo groans and slumps before straightening back up again. "In three hours?"

Annabeth raises an eyebrow. "You stay here until eight at closing. I leave in three hours."

Leo shifts. "Sometimes the cafe down the street has free muffins at noon. I can't just let that opportunity slip out of my hands, can I?"

She stops her sorting and stares up at him. "It's every Friday, isn't it?"

He sighs. "Free Muffin Friday at CiCi's Cafe, I can't pass it up. Plus, the girl at the register is total eye candy, so that's always a good deal."

Reluctantly, Annabeth closes the register, with a sigh, she says, "You order the books, I'll mop the kids section?"

"Deal. After, we meet up and restock the nonfiction then finish the day off by cleaning the front windows?"

Annabeth stands and smiles. "Then I want a muffin."

He gives a small but sort of stressed smile. "Good thing they're free."

* * *

Annabeth is a simple person.

She likes plain black coffee, cheese pizza, and vanilla ice cream over all else. She reads books in her free time. Come on, she works at a library. She hums to the radio on the way to work and has three pairs of socks she always keeps clean. She never paints her nails and wears one pair of pants. She isn't spontaneous, she isn't outspoken, yet not down-to-earth type either.

She's just Annabeth.

So when Leo Valdez questions why she tells the cashier to "give me whatever's good", she can't even answer.

The best she can give him is, "Today just feels like an out-of-the-ordinary kinda day."

He can't help but agree.

After working three hours by mopping, scrubbing, ordering, stocking, shelving, and wiping down the store's large front windows, the two finally finish at noon, and, as promised, they walk down the street to CiCi's cafe for the amazingly free muffins.

For about an hour, Annabeth and Leo eat muffins, drink coffee, talk work gossip about the other coworkers (surprisingly enough, there are other people working beside them two, the others wouldn't give up their Friday's though), and eventually Piper texts Annabeth in all caps with a " _911 FREaKING EMERGENCY, coME NOW FaST PLeASE"_. Annabeth knows not to worry, but she still bids Leo a quick goodbye and heads home, taking the first yellow cab there.

When she arrives in front of the building, she sees some sort of camera crew setting up outside the front lobby. Curiously, Annabeth walks slow to the doors, trying not to look conspicuous, and finds out by looking on the side of one of the large vans, that none other than Aphrodite is filming outside her apartment.

Though Annabeth isn't that big of a fan of the show, she still finds it mildly interesting and kind of freaks out when she does realize that her apartment building will be on The News. She figures it's for Percy Jackson, however, which means that they'll be on her floor, filming in front of her apartment.

She taps her foot excessively fast as she waits for the elevator to _hurry up, please, Piper needs to hear this._

Annabeth practically runs to her apartment door and, frankly, she's a bit jarred upon seeing the door actually locked. Fumbling messily with her keys, Annabeth gets the door open and runs inside to Piper, who lay sprawled across the couch.

"What is it?" Annabeth asks, slightly out of breath.

Piper frowns at her. "What do you mean, 'what is it'?"

Annabeth drops her bag to the floor and throws her keys on top of it. "What's the 911-freaking-emergency you had me rush here for?"

Recognition crosses her features and she leans back to her lying position. "Oh! Right, I'm bored."

Annabeth's shoulders slump. "Piper! I was eating lunch with a friend, why would you- I was right in the middle of something and you interrupted me, had me come all the way across town here, to tell me you're bored."

Piper frowns. "You didn't tell me you had any other friends?"

Annabeth waves her off and sits on the couch on top of Piper's feet. "It's just Leo."

"Ah," Piper realizes, "muffins?"

Annabeth looks at her friend oddly. "Yeah, how'd you know?"

Piper only shrugs as a response. "CiCi's is the best."

Annabeth leans back on the couch and closes her eyes, enjoying the relaxation of a quiet apartment. "You'll never believe who I saw on the way here."

She hears Piper snort. "Last time you said that it was Percy Jackson, so this has to be good."

"Aphrodite."

It's silent for a moment so Annabeth opens one eye to see Piper frantically pressing buttons on the t.v. remote. Annabeth chuckles at her friend as the telly lights up with none other than Aphrodite's face.

The t.v. star is absolutely beaming at the camera, she looks like an investigative journalist, right on scene, what with being outside a famous building, having a microphone in her hand, and being recorded on a hand-held camera. "Good afternoon, my lovely viewers. Today we have something very special in store for you. Right now, my team and I are outside what a fan has claimed to be Percy Jackson's apartment building. This Jackson-lover came to me over direct message on Twitter saying he'd found the exact room our favourite Olympian is living in currently." She throws a glamorous smile at the camera. "We're here to test that theory."

"You know what would be funny?" Annabeth comments as Aphrodite goes on to interview the fan on how he found the location. Piper hums in response. "What if when they knock on the door, Jason answers."

Piper looks up at Annabeth with a curious expression. "Oh my gosh, we have to warn them."

Annabeth doesn't even know how her friends brain came to that conclusion. "We can't just go to a celebrity's door and tell them they're about to be bombarded by Aphrodite- of all people."

Piper stands anyway. "Yeah, but we can tell Jason. Plus, he is a celebrity, as you said, he probably won't answer the door anyway."

Piper shuts off the telly and walks to the door, she slides on a pair of sandals and looks back to Annabeth who's on the couch. "Well? You better come with me."

Reluctantly enough, Annabeth gets up and decides to just go in her socks, it's not as if it's a far journey.

Piper carefully opens the door and glances back and forth across the hallway until deeming it empty, Annabeth follows suit. They tiptoe over the hall, only two doors down, and, once again, look around to make sure it's empty.

Annabeth knocks on the door.

Annabeth and Piper make eye contact; this might not have been their best idea.

The door opens. It's not Jason.

The only thing Annabeth completely registers is how much of a mess Percy Jackson looks.

His hair is in every single direction known to man, his clothes are wrinkled and baggy, as if they're not even his. His eyes are tired looking, with dark bags, his eyelids drooping as if he can barely keep them open. "Yeah?" he says in a raspy voice, like he just woke up from a nap.

Piper takes over. "Is Jason here?"

Percy Jackson frowns. "Who's asking?"

Annabeth wishes she could think of anything but the fact that he's so gorgeous, and how they could be seconds away from being on the dreaded Aphrodite's show.

Piper shifts. "I'm Piper, I've been going out with Jason for a couple of weeks, I just wanted to talk to him, I guess."

He looks Piper up and down, a strange glint in his eyes. "Jason's not here. He's in class. Sorry, bye."

He goes to shut the door, but in an uncharacteristic attempt to be a good person, Annabeth stupidly shoves her foot in way of the door. Biting back a scream and a couple tears of pain, Annabeth remains cool as Percy Jackson once again opens the door. "Jason's not here-"

"We aren't actually here to see Jason," Annabeth interrupts him.

Piper shifts oddly and watches them.

Percy's grip on the door visibly tightens. "Listen, I'm not going to sign anything or take pictures, so please, just go on ahead and get a life..." He slowly starts to close the door again, but Annabeth strangely doesn't back down.

"Listen, this really is Piper, and we have a valid reason of knocking on your door. Trust me, we don't want an autograph, in fact, we live just down the hall, see?" She points to the open apartment door two doors down. Percy looks back from them to their flat door indecisively. When he doesn't object, Annabeth continues. "I was just on my way back from work and, well, you've seen Aphrodite's show, yes? Well, she's coming. A fan sent in an address to your apartment and they're kind of on their way up now."

Percy looks at them for a second. He sighs. "Sorry, I don't have time for this."

Annabeth frowns. "But she's probably not going to leave unless you answer-"

Piper grabs Annabeth's arm. "Come on, Beth, let's just go.."

Suddenly, the three hear the audible ding of the elevator open. "And this is it, folks: the floor none other than Percy Jackson lives on! In just a moment, we'll be arriving at his front door. Isn't this just thrilling?"

Annabeth sends a pointed look towards the Olympian.

Percy Jackson, though, curses under his breath. He looks down the hall as Aphrodite's voice only gets louder, then looks at the two girls standing in front of his door. Unexpectedly, he grabs the girls and pulls them in his flat, closing the door behind them.

"What was that for?" Piper asks.

Percy locks the door and turns towards them. "There's no way you would've made it to your flat in time. You probably would've been interviewed or something."

As Percy walks past the two of them into the kitchen to sit on the counter and eat a bowl of Spaghetti-O's, Annabeth realizes how odd it is to be in Percy Jackson's apartment.

She finds, oddly enough, that his flat is bigger than hers is, despite living across the hall from each other. His ceilings are taller and the living room is bigger. His kitchen is ten times as nice as Annabeth's is, yet the fanciness of the marble countertops and stainless steel refrigerator is ruined by the gangly boy sitting by the stove, eating his bowl of canned soup.

"Have a remote anywhere?" Piper asks.

Percy gestures towards the counter, where the remote sits on top of a placemat. Piper turns the television on, which is visible from the kitchen, and Aphrodite's face plays on the screen. She's walking down the hall on their floor, Annabeth sees in the background behind Aphrodite her open door leading to her flat.

The camera turns to a boy, probably fifteen, with curly brown hair and an Avengers shirt. "Alright," Aphrodite says, her eyes lighting with excitement, "which one is it, Austin?"

Austin pushes his glasses up his nose and waves his hand in a 'follow me' gesture. The camera shows the two of them tiptoeing down the hall, right past Percy's real apartment, where they all hide.

Percy takes a mouthful of his soup. "So I had nothing to worry about anyway."

Annabeth shifts awkwardly, standing uncomfortably in his apartment, feeling less than welcome. "It was a close call."

Aphrodite grins madly at the camera and knocks on whoever's door, bouncing on the balls of her feet as she waits. The door opens and poor Mr. D, the local crazy drunk freeloader, stands in the doorway, frowning at the pretty girl and the bright lights. "Wuzzgoinon?" he slurs.

Aphrodite doesn't move, her eyes wide. " _Dionysus?_ " she coughs, "Uh, I mean, hello, sir! Does Percy Jackson happen to live in your flat?"

Annabeth and Piper share an amused look with each other; who knew the drunk guy from down the hall would somehow know Aphrodite, of all people.

Mr. D grunts and points behind the camera man. "Johnson lives in number eighteen, please leave me alone." He shuts the door.

The camera follows Austin and Aphrodite as they walk back down the hall to number five.

Percy curses into his soup. "He can't remember my name, but he knows where I live?"

They barely have time to asses this situation before there's a knock on the door. Annabeth looks towards the t.v. and sees the two standing in front of the door in anticipation.

The three wait in silence for a moment or two before Piper walks to the door and opens it. She keeps it so Percy isn't visible through the small crack.

Annabeth feels dizzy, seeing the scene on the telly and in front of her.

Aphrodite's smile only becomes brighter. "Hello, is Percy Jackson in?"

Piper frowns, and Annabeth awards her on her acting. "No," she says, "um, there's no Percy Jackson in this residence, sorry."

Aphrodite doesn't falter. "Please," she says. "Don't be ridiculous. Can we speak with him? We just want a quick question and answer session is all."

Annabeth snorts. Quick, her ass.

Aphrodite perks up, she gets on her toes and tries to lean above Piper to see in the door. "I heard something. I don't know if Mr. Jackson is really in there, but someone is."

Annabeth groans, the last thing she wants is to be on t.v.. She comes to the door and pokes her head in next to Piper's. "Sorry," she says deceitfully, the fakest smile on her face, "but we're both Jewish and aren't looking to switch. Apologies for wasting your time, ma'am, best of luck to you!" She closes the door.

Piper laughs, throwing her head back as her shoulders shake. Annabeth chuckles too, feeling it bubble in her stomach. "Nice job, Beth! I didn't know you had it in you."

Annabeth shrugs, not a bit bothered with Piper not using her real name. "She's fine on screen, but in real life Aphrodite's kind of irritating."

Percy stepped down from the counter. "Thanks for saving me, I guess."

Annabeth smiles. "It's cool." Piper elbows her in the spine.

Percy leans on one foot, as if the other one is hurting him. "I don't know how I can repay you guys…"

Piper shrugs. "You don't have to. Dating your cousin is payment enough."

Percy chuckles and Annabeth elbows Piper this time. "We'll get out of your hair," Annabeth says, grabbing Piper's elbow and backing towards the door.

Piper grins. "Ah, yes, Bethy and I have places to be!"

"We do?"

"Farewell, Percy Jackson!" Piper yells back to him.

As the door closes, Annabeth sees him smile and wave back. He's a lot more handsome when he's smiling, she thinks.

Piper drags her back to their apartment, and this time, she closes the door. Annabeth follows her roommate into the kitchen where Piper gets two glasses and fills them with lemonade.

Piper pretty much downs the entire glass in a second. "You'll never believe how much homework I have this weekend." Annabeth watches as Piper takes her phone out of her bag which rests on the counter and starts typing frantically. "And, this morning, I didn't even have time to get coffee so I'm running on pure adrenaline and now lemonade. I haven't gotten to talk to Jason yet today, don't look at me like that. Also I saw Dean on the bus on my way home, luckily he didn't see me but it was a pretty close call. And I put my sock on inside out this morning and it was so uncomfortable, and we ran out of laundry detergent, like, a week ago so all our clothes are dirty and we really need to go grocery shopping. I found out I'm failing one of my classes which is so frustrating because I actually pay for those courses— ."

"Piper," Annabeth says, watching her friend vent and pace the kitchen, not taking her eyes from her phone. Piper presses one last button on her phone and pockets it, looking up to meet Annabeth's eyes. "Why are you all hyped up? And what are these places we have to be at?"

Piper smiles. "You ever want a day off?" Annabeth nods wearily. "Well, me too, so we're gonna go down to the beach, get ready."

"Okay," Annabeth weakly agrees, feeling highly amused at her friend.

Yeah, Annabeth isn't spontaneous in the slightest, at least, she doesn't like to be. But Piper is all over the place all the time, so they sorta complete each other, in a way.

* * *

"Gooooood afternoon, ladies and gents. As you should know, today is February sixth, so let's get together and sing some Bob Marley, huh?" The radio announcer starts playing 'Three Little Birds' so Annabeth and Piper sing along. Loudly.

It turns out, Piper wasn't being weird, but incredibly practical. Strangely enough, it's a very sunny, warm day for a February afternoon in New York so it's a perfect day for the beach. Piper found a cheap rental car place that had one very small, very inexpensive car ready for the two of them by the time they were in their swimsuits. So yeah, practical.

The car windows are rolled down all the way, the fresh air and wind breezing in the car, the loud singing to Bob Marley breezing out, getting odd looks from people on the streets. At a stoplight, a group of kids on a field trip took pictures of them. Maybe it was the Empire State Building behind them, maybe it was Piper standing in the car, her torso out of the moon roof as she screamed the words to 'No Woman, No Cry'. Annabeth prefered the former.

By the time the two girls make it to the beach, the sun is already going down, 'High Tide or Low Tide' plays on the radio, the shores are empty and so are the waves; they have the whole beach to themselves; the whole world to themselves. As soon as the car is in park, they rip open the doors and race each other to the docks, the sound of Bob Marley on the car radio still playing loudly.

Their footsteps pound on the damp wood, and then, in one second, they're in the air, and in the water.

* * *

 **hello hello there**

 **today marks halfway through the semester so all my teachers are handing out tests left and right and they're putting in grades and im biting my nails because i actually have really good grades right now so im praying that thats how they will stay. also i have a theater performance next week that we have barely been able to work on in class and another performance on the 23 that we haven't finished memorizing or choreographing yet and auditions for the musical is on the 29 and dance auditions are the 30 and callbacks are the 31 but i also have PSATs on the 24 and a spanish presentation on the 29**

 **so im stressed.**

 **anyway**

 **i hope you all liked this chapter! it's one of my favorites and guess what lads! we are finally to the parts where there is no more filler! we're right in the thick of it lads! im so excited next chapter is awesome but the one after it is even better and the one after that one is even better and don't even get me started on the one after that. gah! i'm so excited!**

 **there wasn't much percabeth in this chapter yes, i know, but piper and annabeth are the cutest so i just had to. also! before yall come at me, there is a reason percy was acting so weird! yes! i have an explanation for that! you just have to wait!**

 **i really hope you're all having an excellent friday, i'm coming to you from the past (it's thursday night) because i wanted to get this all prepared so i wouldn't really have to do anything tomorrow except upload.**

 **im not responding to reviews for last chapter, but i will for this one, BUT for now i'm gonna recommend some of my favorite fics right now.**

 **My Love, My Destruction by Girlishly Greek. Kat is a) an amazing person b) an amazing writer and c) this story has done things to my little ol' heart that shouldn't be aloud. honestly, this is such a wonderful story and if you have any desire to read any percabeth fic, this is absolutely for you.**

 **On Knife's Edge by herecomesthepun. okaaaaaaaaaaaay if you don't know this author or this story than clearly you are missing out. herecomesthepun gave us the absolute GEM that is Silver Screen which is one of my favorite fics ever. Go read this story you will love it and that is a guarantee.**

 **Memories/Dreams by Another Wise Girl. once again if you aren't reading this what have you been doing in this fandom? its so amazing and if you love long, slowburn fics then this is 100 percent for you. she does song tributes and her taste in music is so good? this story is, as said in the summary, high school drama.. with a twist. it's a series, Memories is first, and Dreams is the sequel. (right now she's on a hiatus, and i have no idea where she is, but when she returns! it will be epic!)**

 **idk, those are the fics im currently reading and obsessed with, also right now im rereading lost hero and im actually cracking up jason is such an idiot i love him. also leo is so emo and festus is such a cute violent dragon and piper is so badass and annabeth is so sad and i cri my children.**

 **anyway! this is too long.**

 **have a fantastic day and weekend! i hope you're not as stressed as i am, i literally wouldn't wish this on my worst enemies.**

 **-Leigh**


	13. Chapter 13

Chapter Thirteen

" _Once upon a time, I was falling in love, now I'm only falling apart."_

 _-Bonnie Tyler_

* * *

Percy doesn't understand what Jason and Nico don't get when he says that he really doesn't need (or want) an intervention.

"Percy," Jason says firmly, like a strict parent about to ground his son, as he stands in the doorway of Percy's room. Nico stands next to him, arms crossed. Percy almost laughs because they look like parents scolding their child, but he doesn't have the energy. "Dude, come on, you've been locked in here for over a week. No sunlight or interaction with other people-"

"I talked to your girlfriend literally three hours ago," Percy retorts, going back to hide under his covers. All he wants is to eat canned soup and sleep, is there really a problem with that?

Percy hears Jason shift in the doorway; he obviously doesn't know that confrontation even happened. "Well, that doesn't count. You need to go get sunlight, man. You need sustenance other than canned soup."

Percy doesn't make a move, he wants to fall back asleep.

Percy hears what sounds like someone pounding their head on the wall, then a groan. "Percy, we know why you're doing this to yourself. Sally called, she explained everything." Nico's voice gets softer. "She's worried about you. We're worried about you. So get your ass out of bed and quit your damn pity party, it's pathetic." He leaves.

As much as he tells himself it doesn't bother him, it really does. Percy doesn't want to feel guilty for worrying these guys, but he just wants to _forget._ He would love to hide and pretend like everything is fine. Like his mother won't be leaving in three weeks.

"Percy," Jason says softly, though there is still a disappointed and frustrated edge to it. "Your mom is leaving in less than a month. Just… get back to normal for a while, for her. Then you have all the right to slouch around." He pauses. "I wouldn't want my mother's last image of me being an ass who only eats soup and sleeps all day. Pretend to be alright, Percy, just don't be a dick, because she's suffering too." With that note, he leaves.

Slowly, Percy comes out from his cocoon of blankets, the bright light from his window blinding him. He groans.

He can pretend, alright.

Percy gets up to take a shower, limping on the way.

He doesn't see the writing from his soulmate, and completely forgets about her as he tries to figure out what he's going to do with himself.

He can't think of anything, and he washes her note down the drain along with his own self-understanding.

* * *

" _I love it when my dreams play hard to get; my passion finds it so damn sexy." Christopher Poindexter_

Though her soulmate is completely ignoring her, Annabeth has high hopes for her love life. As a matter of fact, Percy Jackson, the scruffy, kind of sad looking Olympic swimmer from down the hall (who just so happens to be Annabeth's best friend's boyfriend's cousin), came by the other day and asked her on a date.

To be quite frank, she was shocked and ended up being late for work.

How it happened?

Annabeth was shoving her shoe on, keys in her mouth, rushing towards the kitchen counter which had her bag on it, when someone knocked on the door. She put her keys in her bag, shouldered it, and walked to the front door.

And there he was. Percy Jackson.

He certainly looked different from how Annabeth had remembered him the first time she met him. He looked… cleaner, to say the least. He smelled like nice cologne, and his shirt was light blue instead of a dark black hoodie. His hair was messy, but kept. Overall, he seemed more put together.

"Hi?" Annabeth half-smiled, half-grimaced. She had no idea what he wanted, but she hoped it wouldn't make her late; she couldn't handle being late again. "You need something?"

Percy seemed sort of put off by the question, but he recovered eventually. "Would you like to go out sometime?"

That took her off guard.

Her gut instinct was to say, 'no, i don't know you', but her heart screamed, 'VALENTINES DAY IS IN A WEEK; LET ME HAVE THIS, PLEASE,' and then her mouth said, "Sure, I'd love to," like an idiot.

And then he smiled, rather charmingly, and said, "Okay, I'll pick you up around seven," and then walked off.

Annabeth stood there for a couple minutes and was, as previously stated, late for work.

* * *

Percy just did the most out-of-character thing he'd ever done and he doesn't regret a second of it.

In his defense, Jason told him to 'get himself together', or something along the lines of that, but to Percy, that means having good news for his mother. The best news he could give her at a time like this is that Percy's met someone.

So he picked virtually the easiest girl to take out and asked her on a date.

Which was pretty stupid, even for him.

But Beth (was that her name? Didn't Piper call her Beth?) seemed nice enough when he first met her, so Percy went with what he (didn't really) know and asked her out. She did say yes, so he must be doing something right.

Well, technically she said, "sure, I'd love to," but that doesn't really matter.

And now he's picking her up around seven.

Oh god.

* * *

This time, it's Annabeth's turn for the first date.

Piper gets overly excited when Annabeth tells her that _Percy Jackson_ from down the hall (y'know, the Olympic swimmer?) asked her out on a date, and automatically decides Annabeth is her dress up doll.

So, six forty-five and Annabeth is ready. As a team, they decided (after a long discussion about the proper etiquette of a first date, "I know it should be casual, Annabeth, but he makes more money for swimming around everyday than you do in a _year_.") cute casual seemed like the best choice. Annabeth ended up wearing a flowy top and jeans because that was the best they could come up with after the only details of their date being, "I'll pick you up around seven?".

Annabeth stops as her and Piper make their way back into the living room from Piper's room. They had just spent over an hour searching for the strappy silver sandals that are becoming wildly popular for first dates. "Wait, Piper. I need a jacket."

Piper frowns and walks around Annabeth, then flops on the couch. "No, you don't. Unless he wants to go to a movie theater, or fly down the freeway in a convertible. You'll be fine."

Annabeth starts pacing, the realization hitting her like a truck. "What if my soulmate writes? It'll show up and Percy will question it and then I'll have to explain. Also, if Percy sees this tattoo then he'll probably ask about it, maybe. And I don't want to have to explain that my soulmate, who I've recently been talking to, got a tattoo on his arm, which is now permanently on mine. You know, maybe I should cancel this date, because it just feels like I'm cheating all over again. I can't do another Travis, Piper, I can't."

Piper races over to her friend and grabs her hands. "Stop saying that. You are going on this date and you will like it. Go ahead and get my jacket from the hallway closet, the cute leather one, but Annabeth, you have to understand, this is good for you." Annabeth makes a disapproving face. Piper rolls her eyes. "Look at me. Dean is my soulmate, but you don't see me drooling after him, or feeling any guilt for being with Jason. I really like Jason, okay? And it doesn't matter if he's my soulmate or not. So, it doesn't matter if Percy isn't your soulmate."

Annabeth's frown deepens, she's starting to feel a tad queasy. "This is different."

Piper raises an eyebrow. "Enlighten me."

Annabeth sighs. "I really like my soulmate, I do. And I'm talking to him-"

"More like you were talking to him. Tell me, when was the last time you two chatted on the bathroom stall?" Piper interjected.

Annabeth cringes. "Please don't call my arm 'the bathroom stall'. It's gross." Piper smiles. "Listen, I like Percy. He's cute, obviously has a lot of money, so he could financially support me, I guess. Even though I'm not even a little concerned about money— or anything, but whatever! My soulmate, Piper, my soulmate."

Piper purses her lips for a moment. "Fine, just do me this solid."

"Anything."

"Go out with Percy tonight, and if it sucks, you never have to see him again-"

Annabeth shakes her head. "Unlikely, if you and Jason ever get married or something, Percy will be at the wedding, and as the maid of honor, I'd have to be there too."

Piper pauses. "Who said you'd be the maid of honor at my wedding?"

Annabeth says, "Well, I just assumed because obviously you're my maid of honor, so-"

"Annabeth, I'm kidding, of course you're my maid of honor," Piper smiles. "Anyway, go out with Percy, and have a good time, or else I'll suffocate you in your sleep."

Annabeth nods. "That took quite a turn."

Piper shrugs. "I had to get my point across somehow. Hey! I just remembered something. This morning I was eating breakfast and, by the way, the waffles from downstairs are so delicious. I'm surprised we haven't had them yet. Oh my gosh, I put some maple syrup on them and it just makes my mouth water thinking about it-"

"Get back on track, Rachael Ray."

"Right, so I'm eating my waffles and scrolling through twitter when I see a tweet - Aphrodite always tweets about-"

"You follow Aphrodite on twitter?"

"Of course." Piper makes a face, as if it's just ridiculous to even ask such a question. "Anyway, so she always tweets earlier in the day what her evening show will be about, and today's episode is about first dates! And this was after you texted me about the whole 'Percy made me late for work' fiasco. So, obviously I was freaking out, because, I mean, what a coincidence!"

Annabeth puts her hands on Piper's shoulders to hopefully calm her down. "Lets just watch it. You did record it, right?"

Piper scoffs as they both head to the couch. "Of course, besides reruns of Law and Order and The Office, Aphrodite's show is the only thing we record."

Annabeth nods. "That's true." As Piper scrolls through the recorded episodes of The News, Annabeth says, "Hey, how much money do you bet Aphrodite had to pay in order to buy the rights for her shows name?"

Piper laughs. "Probably a lot. She _was_ buying the rights off of pretty much every single news show that exists. Ah, here we go, First Dates, today's episode." Piper clicks on the link and Aphrodite's smiling face shows up on the screen.

"Hello, my soon-to-not-be-single ladies and gentlemen! Hope everyone has had a wonderful day, I know you are, because you are going on a first date today!" Piper nudges Annabeth. "Well, get ready, because these tips and tricks are here to help you be prepared for the inevitable uncomfortableness that first dates always are." Aphrodite flashes a bright smile.

The doorbell rings.

Annabeth looks to Piper. An understanding passes through them: Annabeth may just be absolutely screwed.

They both fly up and run to the door, then Annabeth fixes her shirt while Piper pats down any pieces of hair that may have been disturbed. "Wait," Piper says, "Don't forget your jacket."

"Oh right." She grabs the jacket from the closet and puts it on, smoothing it down.

Annabeth takes a deep breath and opens the door.

Percy stands with Jason beside him. "Hey," Percy says with a smile.

"Hi," Annabeth responds, matching his smile.

Piper pipes up from behind Annabeth, "Hey, Jason, what're you doing here?"

Jason perks up, hearing his name. "Uh, I found my copy of Love Actually because I remembered you said it's your favorite movie, so I thought we could maybe watch it?"

Piper gleams. "So, like a double date?"

Percy's chuckles nervously. "No, actually, Beth and I are going somewhere else."

Annabeth frowns at his mistake. "Actually, it's A-"

"Yes, _Beth,_ it is getting really late, so you two should head out now. See you two later!" Jason interrupts, shuffling a little and exchanging his position for Annabeth's, so now Jason and Piper are inside and Annabeth and Percy are out.

Percy shakes his head at Jason. "Alright, let's go then?"

Annabeth sobers from her initial confusion and nods at Percy. "See you later, Piper."

Piper winks and mouths, "Good luck!"

After the door is shut and not locked, Jason turns to Piper. "I need to tell you something."

* * *

 **hello hello there**

 **ALSO I UPLOAD EVERY FRIDAY MORNING JUST IN CASE YALL DIDN'T KNOW NOW YOU DO :)**

 **oh my gosh im so sorry for that massive cliff hanger but trust me next upload- it'll be so worth it you guys they actually go on a _date_. woah i know things are picking up**

 **Im literally doing this on wednesday night because ik i'll be so busy so hello from the past its actually wednesday for me right now how fun?**

 **review responses!**

 **AnnabethGinevraJacksonPotter: thank you so much for reviewing you're the sweetest person ever! i hope you're having the greatest friday! -Leigh**

 **Percabeth824: thank you so much for your kind words, they mean so much to me! i hope you enjoyed this chapter and i hope you're excited for next chapter (it's a woozie) and i wish you a good day! -Leigh**

 **Willow Lark: I'm glad you're back from your break! lol welcome back to fanfiction! I'm uber excited that you like my story and i really hope you liked this chapter, and i hope you have a great day! thank you for reading and reviewing also! -Leigh**

 **Emopunk mad hatter fangirl: first of all your username is magnificent can i just say. (also nico and jason didn't tell percy about annabeth being his soulmate because they wanted percy to figure it out himself). thank you so much for reading and reviewing, i loved reading your comment, it made me so happy to see that you like my story! I hope you have a fabulous friday! -Leigh**

 **GirlishlyGreek: KAT im not even kidding when i see your review i get the actual biggest smile on my face and im laughing like a maniac when im reading them. YOURE THE BEST PERSON EVER THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR EVERYTHING! oh my gosh when you brought up Sixth Period Study Hall i nearly got whiplash. it seems like so long ago but it was actually only a couple months? i can't really remember yikes. anyway thank you for existing, you make my day and i love you. have a fab friday boo. xxxLeigh**

 **The Patil Twins: i'm sorry for killing you like this but it was mandatory. PLEASE don't die of stress or suspense girl, also don't apologize for reading it a day late! i feel you girlie! i so so hope you enjoyed this chapter and i wish you a fantastic day! thank you for being such a lovely reader and supporter, you're the bestest! -Leigh**

 **Thanks so so much to everyone who reviewed, you all make my day reading your responses.**

 **I hope your fridays are going fantastically (i know mine is because on saturaday im going to a murder mystery party and also the guy i like will be there and im such a teenage girl but im so excited)**

 **anyway**

 **HAVE A LOVELY DAY I'LL SEE YOU ALL NEXT FRIDAY!**

 **xoxoxoxoxoxoxox Leigh**


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter Fourteen

" _Looking out on the morning rain I used to feel so uninspired; And when I knew I had to face another day; Lord, it made me feel so tired. Before the day I met you, life was so unkind; But you're the key to my peace of mind. 'Cause you make me feel; You make me feel; You make me feel like a natural woman_." _\- Aretha Franklin_

* * *

Percy decides that the best (and safest) option would be to take her somewhere he wouldn't be recognized.

Nico suggested the movies, but the movies are only good for, like, a fourth date? Maybe? But movies on a first date are a mistake. You sit there, next to each other, not talking, and then afterward your mind is all muddled and stuck in a different reality and it's all a mess.

Percy has had a few first dates at the movies that he would rather not like to redo.

Plus, he's not all nervous about this date. He's really only doing it to get back into reality. Living in his bedroom for weeks can only do harm.

After Jason recommended going _wine tasting_ , which is definitely a date you save until after you're married and have had three kids, Percy decided to pick the date himself.

After a while he chose to make the date something very not-special. He doesn't plan on a second date, so why go all out?

Don't get him wrong: Percy does not get joy out of playing with people's hearts, or whatever, but soon after he asked Beth out, he realized how much of a mistake it was. He thought for a hot minute that this was a good way to help himself, but now he feels bad.

He's not looking for a relationship, but Beth might be. And she's roommates with his cousin's girlfriend, so that also a downside.

Percy decides on the pier.

For someone he guessed had been living in New York for a while, Beth had probably been to the pier before and therefore, it wouldn't be as exciting as it would be if she was going for the first time.

He learns quite a bit about her on the ride over (he drives). It turns out, Beth works at a library, and she is also an author.

He's pretty sure she already knows, but he explains his career anyway. He tries not to look at her while driving, but as he talks he can see her nodding her head.

Okay. Let's just get this straight: Percy hasn't gone on many dates, so he has no idea what he's doing.

But on the few dates he had gone on, the girls just find him attractive and lead with that. The dates always go the same. The girl is pushy and Percy is awkward. Then she gets mad when he doesn't walk her to her door, but normally Percy just wants to leave so bad that he honestly just forgets. He rarely has second dates.

But Beth seems different to Percy. She seems to really want to hear what he's saying. (At least, that's what he's been picking up from her head nodding.) Percy feels upset about that because, yes, she seems really sweet and genuine, but as of now, he really isn't in the best state of mind to start a relationship.

Once they arrive at the pier, the first thing they decide to do is eat. "That way we won't be hungry later and have to stop having fun to eat," Beth explains as they walk to a pizza parlor.

They walk closely and if an outside observer saw them, they'd definitely look like they're on a date. Percy supposes that's a good thing, they are on a date. He takes her hand, then Beth looks up at him (because she's very much shorter than he is) and smiles.

His heart skips a beat. Beth's eyes are a whole lot more piercing and bright than he remembered. Her hair more blonde.

It aches him knowing that he won't be having a second date, because jeez, she's really something (as far as he can tell). It especially sucks considering that her personality is one-of-a-kind and she's the nicest person he's met. (She did save his life from almost the whole world knowing where he lives.) But he sucks down his regret because possibly he could have a good time tonight and thinking of sad things will make him sad, and truly that's not the target for tonight.

The pizza parlor's daily special is cashier's choice, and in light of the fact that the cashier happens to be a nerdy looking teenager, maybe sixteen, Percy chooses two slices of that one. Sue him, he's feeling bold.

"I'll have two slices of cheese pizza, please," Beth asks politely. The boy slides his glasses up his nose and inputs the numbers.

Percy stares at Beth incredulously. " _Cheese pizza?_ Please don't tell me you just asked for _cheese pizza?_ "

Beth smiles daringly at him. "Yup. Cheese pizza is the best. Can't go wrong."

He raises an eyebrow at her, entirely too amused by her response than anything. "Come on, you have to have toppings."

She pretends as if she's considering this while saying, "No, I don't. And it's not like cashier's choice is going to be any better."

Percy leans his hand on the counter. "Did you see the cashier? I'll bet the kid _lives_ in pepperoni."

Beth smirks. "You can't bet that he's going to give you any of his pepperoni. He might as well put anchovies on your pizza."

Percy cringes. "Well, I'll take what I can get." Beth laughs, and Percy's heart does that thing again: where it speeds up really fast for, like, no reason.

The cashier (his name is Lucas) clears his throat. "Ten forty-seven."

And Percy hands his credit card before Beth can even argue. Though she does glare. (It's a joke-glare, the kind with the hidden amusement, but he can't help but be kind of terrified.)

Rule One: As the guy, always pay, or you're a douche. (This means you can't forget your wallet, because Percy did that once and it wasn't good.)

Once Lucas gives Percy the receipt, he tells them, "Your number is eight nineteen forty-seven-dot-seventy-six. Don't forget it, cause once we call it and you don't get your pizza, we're throwing it away."

Percy stares at Lucas for a couple of seconds before saying, "Could you repeat the numbers? And can I have a pen to write it down?"

Lucas mutters something under his breath while he looks for a pen. Percy makes a face of amused disbelief to Beth who laughs softly.

"Okay," Lucas says, once Percy has the pen and is ready to write the numbers down on his left arm. "Eight. Nineteen. Forty-seven. Dot. Seventy-six." He says them slowly as if talking to a child.

Percy writes each number, then stops, staring at his arm. His soulmate, Annabeth, would probably see this later, and after not responding to all her notes for the past week (has it really been a week?) he feels bad for just writing something down to remember and not even regarding her.

"Hey? Dude? I need my pen back," Lucas interrupts his thoughts, and Percy looks up at Beth who's staring at him oddly.

"Yeah," Percy says, "Sorry…. I just.. Um.." He trails off and writes on his arm: _haha sorry but I never wouldve remembered,_ then caps the pen and hands it to Lucas.

Percy now feels bad, his soulmate, who's name coincidentally happens to be Annabeth, probably would be hurt knowing he's on a date. But then he thinks, _she dated another guy for four years. One date shouldn't hurt, right?_

He just starts to feel worse and worse about himself as the night goes on.

But then their extremely long number is called and the two go up to collect their pizza.

Beth laughs, but Percy doesn't find it very funny. Lucas, their cashier, gave him two slices of cheese pizza.

* * *

"What do you mean, they're soulmates?"

"They both had the same writing on their arm when I saw Annabeth, then Percy the next morning."

"But that doesn't mean-"

"Percy's mom's name is Sally, Piper. He got the letter 's' tattooed on his left wrist for his mom. Annabeth has the same one! And Percy literally told both me and Nico the other day that his soulmates name is Annabeth."

"You make a very compelling argument…. But how is he so dull? Her name is Annabeth, his soulmates name is Annabeth, why doesn't he connect the dots?"

"He thinks her name is Beth."

"Holy shit.. Excuse my French."

"It's alright, Nico's worse, especially when he's watching soccer. He was really rooting for England."

"Percy and Annabeth … has a nice ring to it."

"Yeah."

"Did you really bring Love Actually or is this the only reason you came over here?"

"No, I have the movie."

"Fantastic."

* * *

Their next goal is to go to the arcade.

When they get to the entrance of the building, though, there's a sign that says: **NO FOOD OR DRINK BEYOND THIS POINT**. So him and Beth share a look, then shove their faces with (cheese) pizza. He's sure they'll both get a stomach ache, but who cares?

Beth trips over her feet as they walk inside and Percy grabs her arm to steady her. "Are you okay?" he asks.

She smiles a bit off-putly and says, "Yeah, I-uh, tripped the other day, while running, and twisted my ankle. I'm fine, but I just can't really put all my weight on it."

Percy responds. "That's funny. Just the other day, I twisted my ankle, the stories a bit less tragic as yours, but the injury is just as real."

She smirks. "Let's hear it then. How'd you hurt your ankle?"

Percy takes a breath, and looks down at her (seriously, she's really short) with a raised eyebrow. "Well, I move around in my sleep and I accidentally got all twisted in my blanket, and when I got up in the morning, I fell trying to get untangled." He shrugs.

Beth smiles. "Manly."

Percy smiles and bows. "I know, thank you. Now," he says, turning towards the huge room before them, "what do we do first?"

It is _insane_. Beth is absurdly good (and better than Percy) at every game they play. She beats him in Pac Man, skeeball, Donkey Kong, and the silly basketball game. She rubs it in his face, too.

"How many tickets do you have?" she asks, feigning innocence while they scout the room for more games; they had pretty much done everything.

Percy grumbles, "Five hundred-something. You?"

"Three thousand-something. Not sure."

He could be mad, but there's a small smile on her face that puts butterflies in his stomach, so he moves on quickly. "What about that one?"

He's talking about the dance game. The one where you step on the arrows on the platform and compete against each other. He's never been a good dancer, but he always beats Nico, so he considers himself somewhat good at the game.

Beth tenses up. "Um, you know what? I think I wanna do something else-"

"You're not afraid you're gonna lose, are you?"

Beth pauses, then meets his eye with a gaze burning of a thousand suns and says, "You're on."

She _sucks_. And not 'sucks' in the form that she's just not better than Percy, but she's just really bad at the game. At one point she mixes up her and Percy's screen, which he thought was impossible, but apparently not. Then she switches her right and left, and soon enough, Percy wins. They go again, and again, and she doesn't really get that much better, and after the third round, Percy realizes that he doesn't really want to do it again, but she insists.

She chooses some old 2003 top ten hit song, which she somehow knows every word to. Beth breathes the words under her breath and laughs every time she messes up; by the end both Percy and Beth are kinda sweaty, but laughing and dancing a dance that is most definitely not apart of the game.

The screen pauses and giant, blinking, red letters pop up saying: **YOU LOSE**. The two of them leave their tickets behind because Percy points out that none of the prizes are actually worth getting. (Anything is better than Batman stickers or rainbow slinkies.)

Once they leave the arcade, it's already dark out. Beth takes a deep breath, and Percy looks over to her. There's a ghost of a laugh on her face as she looks up to the night sky. The stars twinkle in her eyes, they look like reflective glass, and her cheeks are flushed from dancing.

She's absolutely beautiful, and Percy doesn't care anymore; he throws everything he previously thought out: she's too unbelievably breathtaking (both physically and personality-wise) to disregard after one date. He wants to see where this goes.

"Do you wanna go get some ice cream?" he asks her, "Down the way, I saw an ice cream parlour."

She smiles at him delicately. "I'd love to."

He gets chocolate and she gets vanilla, to which he protested ("Cheese pizza and vanilla ice cream?" "I like things plain, sue me!"), and then they decide to go walk along the shore once they've finished eating.

Percy doesn't quite understand her yet, because he's only just met her, but he wants to figure her out. He wants to know what kind of evil witch scarred her enough into only liking toppingless foods. He wants to know about her family and her childhood; how she met Piper and why she lives in New York. He wants to read her books, and ask questions about the main character.

Because, for some reason, out of everyone he's met, she sticks out above them all. She makes his heart skip, like, eight beats when she smiles, or laughs. It's all her. Only her. And it's only the first date.

On the shore, they carry their shoes so they can walk where the water hits their ankles. This time, she grabs his hand, and he smiles at her. (Did he mention how beautiful the moonlight makes her look? Because _w o w_.)

It's rather peaceful: the whole scene is. It's fairly late at night, not an inch of sun left in the sky, now replaced with brilliant twinkling lights and the moon, though not full, it's still magnificent and bright. The sand squishes beneath his toes, and he's sure it is under her feet too, but the silence is so comfortable, he doesn't want to break it.

The night is ludic, he decides, for it's the only word he can come up with to describe the high he's been on since it started.

The moment the first drop of rain hits his forehead and he flinches, he knows that this night is more than a first date. It's a new beginning. It's him pushing everything away and letting go for once. It's not Percy Jackson, Olympic gold medalist, traversing around the pier, scouting for a pretty girl. It's just two kids on a date.

(Two silly soulmate kids who are too dumb not to have noticed their spirits are connected, but alright.)

Percy allows himself to become free of the stress that has pushed him so far down lately as Beth laughs while the rain starts to poor, and a huge wave that comes to their knees almost knocks them both over. They run to the sand, hands intertwined and laugh in the rain that consumes them.

"May I have this dance?" Percy reaches his hand towards her as he yells above the pounding rain and crashing waves.

Beth smiles and nods. They dance sloppily and trip in the uneven sand, laughing at themselves and each other.

It's not bad for a first date. Not bad at all.

They can both agree on that.

 **hello hello there**

 **soooooo this chapter was amazing???**

 **next chapter is my number 1 all time favorite one to write and i'm so excited for you guys to see it ahhhh!**

 **sorry for uploading a little late on this lovely friday but i got today off school so i slept in a bit (and had some weeeired dreams)**

 **uhhh my dog literally just ripped some curtains off the window so i might have to go in a sec.**

 **also thank you? to everyone? who wished me good luck with that boy you are all amazing!!!!**

 **(he just likes me as a friend so bleh.)**

 **anyway**

 **i took psats on wednesday and woah that was not fun at all. i definitely failed the math portion because i didn't study at all but oh well.**

 **also i have auditions next week (our school is putting on legally blonde i'm so excited) so wish me luck i guess!**

 **one last thing: i'm uploading a two part story on tuesday (so that the second part will come out on halloween!) so please check that out! i'm soooo proud of it and i hope you all will like it too!**

 **i wish you all a wonderful friday, i know you deserve it!**

 **xx Leigh**


	15. Chapter 15

Chapter Fifteen

"' _L' is for the way you look at me; 'O' is for the only one I see; 'V' is very, very extraordinary; 'E' is even more than anyone that you adore: Love._ " _\- Michael Buble_

* * *

Her smile is brighter this morning than it normally is, which is a lot considering that her smile is generally pretty bright.

Aphrodite gleams at the camera, only seconds until the show goes live. Her script is in front of her, but she doesn't look it over like she normally does. She is simply _buzzing_ with excitement. Her manicured hands tap the rhythm of a old, yet very popular, love song she's quite familiar with. The top t.v. show host fixes one last curl of her hair just as the camera man says, "Three, two, one, live!"

"Good Morning to everyone on this fine day! Whether your relationship is far past the cupcake stage, or simply 'complicated', everyone has the opportunity to have a fantastic Valentine's Day!" Aphrodite quickly glances at her script and reads a note she left for herself, which says: _wing it._

Smiling at the camera again, she continues, "Today is the day for lovers, friends, and family to get together and celebrate the reason we're all here today: love! And for those out there who just so happen to be introverted, incapable of love, and have a traumatizing past that left your family in shambles, no worries! Later on, I'll be doing a special on what to do when you're alone on Love's Day.

"Now, let's dive into what you really came to this show for: celebrities. We all know that scandals and gossip don't stop our favorite stars from meeting or going out with their wonderful soulmates on such a fine day as today. So far, I can solidly tell you that model Reyna Bellona will be partaking in a, possibly, hot date with her long term girlfriend Thalia Grace. Though not soulmates, those two have proven to stick together through the thick and thin of stardom.

"Next on the list is everyone's favorite right now: Bianca di Angelo, the girl who's got everyone's attention these days. Her newest album has had features of beautiful ballads full of lyrics that move you completely after one listen. The album includes songs of heartbreak that make you want to crank up the volume and cry until you've memorized every meaningful lyric Bianca has to offer. As to what she's up to today, we're not entirely sure, but we can hope whoever has broken her has given her a break for just today.

"And as for me? Well, after today's morning special, I'm taking the day off. My husband Hephaestus and I are heading to an unnamed secluded beach where we'll do unmentionable things, hopefully. He enjoys surprising me, and everything he has done is always so sweet. Valentine's Day this year for me is especially wonderful because I get to spend it with my wonderful husband. Maybe one day he'll warm up to be on the show, but for now, you can just imagine how wonderful he is. Right now, we go to commercial break, but when we come back, I have one more particular popular star we'll be discussing. My only hint is that he's been on all our minds as of late. Make sure to tune in after these messages."

Once the cameras are off for the brief three minute intermission, Aphrodite grabs the water that one of the AD's hands her. A young assistant brings a mirror which Aphrodite checks her reflection in. Her Valentine's Day look is definitely one for the books. She wears a yellow shirt with a bright pink blazer. Her hair is beautifully done in curls, fixed with hairspray to stay in position. She has the most brilliant red shade of lipstick, and right before she walked on set, her makeup stylist, Drew Tanaka, threw some glitter in her hair. Aphrodite is very pleased with her appearance on this lovely day.

The assistants and AD's run off behind the camera when the timer starts to run down. The camera's turn back on again and Aphrodite smiles to everyone watching. "Welcome back, hope none of you missed me too much." For the added effect, she adds in a wink. "Now, on to what I've really been waiting for this morning. Today is a special day because we got footage of an exclusive interview with Percy Jackson, the hottie everyone has been obsessed with for the past couple of weeks. An anonymous, outside source sent in the video to me directly over Twitter using a fake account which they later explained to be their cousin's. After watching the footage back last night a few times, it seems as though the interviewer took the video from his phone in his pocket. Percy seemed a little hesitant to answer the questions, but eventually did, and this is that footage."

The screen goes black to what you could only assume to be the video that was taken in someone's pocket. There's a bit of shuffling until a person's voice, probably a younger man, says, "Hey, Perce, how'd the date go?"

There's a bit more fuzziness and shuffling until the undeniable voice of Percy Jackson speaks, "Uh, well, it was good."

"Good?"

"Yeah, I had a good time, I'm sure she did, too."

"Percy, you're soaking wet."

"It rained, and we just got caught in it."

"Did you kiss her?"

"Dude."

"Sorry… but did you?"

"No! It was a first date, you don't kiss someone on the first date."

"Jeez, alright."

Then the video cuts and Aphrodite's smiling face pops up again. "A date? Huh, Percy Jackson? Anonymous claims to know her identity but made it quite clear they wouldn't share the information. As fans we can only guess who the lucky lady might be. Is she his soulmate? If so, how are they connected? Who _is_ she? And finally, how will they be spending they're Valentine's Day? So, Percy, if you're watching this, we hope you and your lucky gall will have a perfect day, and if you do feel like slipping us some information on her identity, you can bet our day will be better than before." Aphrodite flashes the camera a broad, show smile and states, "Next, we'll be heading into what you singles can do on this incredibly lonely day, but first, another commercial break. I'll see you in three minutes, America, after this break."

In two separate apartments, on the same floor, two unsuspecting soulmates shut off their tellys, why does Aphrodite always have to get into everybody's business?, they think.

And why us?, they question.

* * *

As much as Percy doesn't like Aphrodite's show, he finds it kind of funny how she assumes he will be spending the day with Beth. Really, most of the day he'll be with his mom.

Down at the church, they're having a Valentine's Day cookie drive, so Sally invited Percy over to help ice the sugar cookies she made. He guessed they'd all be hearts and he'd have to paint them all with red and pink sprinkles. (He was right.)

As much as it aches his heart to know that he has to say goodbye _next week_ , Percy's glad he gets to spend some alone time with her. Even if they're just decorating cookies that they're not going to eat.

When he's on his 876th cookie, Sally stops what she's doing and looks up at him. Percy pauses for a second to glance at her. She's wearing that secret sort of 'mom' smile, you know the one. "So," Sally starts, the smile growing. "I watched Aphrodite this morning… who is she, sweetheart?"

Percy wants to be annoyed, most kids would be, but he loves his mom so much and a smile starts spreading on his face. (The smile also in no way indicates {at all} that just the mention of Beth makes him happy. Nope.) "Moooom," he draws. "She's just a girl."

"Come on, Percy! Please, tell me!"

And he does.

He puts down his icing first, of course. "Her name is Beth, and she actually lives down the hall from me, so that's kinda how we met."

Sally winces. "Are you sure she's not…."

"Crazy?" Percy suggests. Sally nods. "No, she's not like that."

Sally nods in understanding. "How many dates have you been on?"

"Two, so far. And we're planning to have our third later today."

Sally scrunches up her nose and smiles. "That's amazing, honey. I'm so happy for you." Percy smiles at his mom. "What does she look like?"

Percy's smile softens. "She has this mane of blonde curly hair, and these crazy grey eyes, except sometimes, they're almost reflective and they look like the sky. She's really beautiful."

"Do you have a picture?"

Percy takes out his phone. On their last date, he snuck a picture of her.

They went to an ice cream parlor (oddly enough for a February evening in New York) and Percy begged her to get something other than vanilla. She agreed, but only if she could choose his flavor. She ended up getting vanilla with sprinkles for herself, and ordered Percy one scoop of chocolate, and one of pistachio.

"Once you eat the nasty pistachio, you get to the good part: chocolate. You have to work for it, Percy. Life lesson," she had said, licking her perfectly delicious ice cream. It wasn't a lesson, though. It was just gross ice cream. He had scooped the pistachio off onto a napkin with his spoon, Beth laughing at him the whole time. "Just eat the ice cream, it can't be that bad!" she told him, chuckling. When she was distracted, looking over at the menu above the counter and licking her ice cream, he had taken out his phone and took a picture.

Once Sally sees it, she says, "Oh my gosh! Percy, she's the author of that book I really liked!"

Percy frowns, he knows Beth is an author, but he didn't know of anything she had published. "Which one? You like a lot of books, mom." He smiles.

Sally responds, "The one that I called you really late at night when I finished it. You're dating the author of that book!" Sally laughs at the irony of it. "Beth?, you said her name was…?"

Percy definitely remembers that. His mom called him at three a.m. in tears. He thought she was dying, which scared him half to death, considering. Between tears, she explained that "the horrible author, who writes such beautiful things, killed my favorite character".

Once she had calmed down, she explained that she fell in love with a character from a book about mermaids (maybe? His memory is a bit fuzzy); the character being a side character who acted as a form of comic relief on a pirate ship, and in the chapter she was reading, the author had him fall over the edge of the boat and drown.

"It makes sense, because it was a symbol for how there could be no joy in a world filled with such chaos, because that's what the witch wished for, but he was my favorite, Percy, and now he's dead. I'm sorry for calling you so late, but I didn't know anyone else who'd pick up…"

Yeah, he remembers that clear as day.

"How did you know what she looks like? Was there a picture of her in the book's sleeve or something?" Percy asks his mom as he starts to ice yet another cookie heart.

Sally picks up her icing bag and starts creating a design in her cookie as well. "No, but she was on my podcast. The one I watch in the morning before work."

Percy nods his head.

"Beth, you said her name was?" Sally asks. "I could've sworn it was something else."

"Weird," Percy says, yet doesn't think much of it. His mom reads a lot of books, and in each one, she always falls in love with the one character who gets killed off, then curses the author's name whenever it's mentioned.

It's like some sort of sick, twisted irony. Percy tries not to think about it too much.

"Oh, hey," Percy says a few minutes later, looking at his watch. "I have to leave if I want to make it on time for my date." He stands and walks over to his mom, kissing her cheek. "Bye, love you."

"Love you," she says. "Hey, you don't happen to be busy on Wednesday at ten, do you?"

Percy thinks, then says, "No, why?"

"That's when my plane leaves, and I'd like to say goodbye."

Oh, right. How could he forget?

"I'll be there," he promises. "Bye, I love you."

"I love you too, sweetheart."

He leaves, but lingers at the door. Were the boxes of clothes and books there when he came in? Did the walls always shrink or is it new?

Yeah, definitely a sick, twisted irony.

* * *

"Annabeth!" Piper yells across the apartment to her roommate-slash-sidekick-slash-bestfriend, Annabeth, who innocently sits in the kitchen, sipping her coffee and reading a book she borrowed from the library.

"What is it, Piper?" Annabeth yells back.

There's a pause, then the sound of something falling over, and a muffled yell saying, "Help me?"

Annabeth sighs. She contemplates whether or not it's worth it; her book just got to a really good part, and Piper seems fine. She gets up anyway.

"What do you need, Pipes?"

Piper is halfway in the closet, laying down on her back. She sighs extremely overdramatically. "I don't know what to wear for my date tonight."

"So, you're laying in the closet?"

Cue another deep sigh. "Well, I fell over trying to look for something, and now I'm on the floor with no intention of getting up."

Annabeth smiles amusedly. "Where're you and Jason going?"

Annabeth can hear the smile in Piper's voice as she speaks. "He's taking me to this really fancy French restaurant right in the heart of New York, which is so exciting. Of course, when he told me, I said that he didn't have to take me anywhere expensive, because, honestly, I'd sit in my pajamas with him eating ice cream and watching Friends reruns, but the nutcracker insisted, and I don't have anything to wear."

Annabeth takes a deep breath. "You wanna wear a dress?"

"That's what I was hoping for, but I wore my nicest, and cutest, dress on our first date. I gotta spice it up a bit."

"What about the blue one?" Annabeth suggests. "The dark blue one that touches the floor? And then the tall black heels."

Piper sits up quickly and finds her way out of the closet, her eyes are wide and excited. "You mean the blue dress you wore when you did press for your book?"

"Yeah, that one."

"The one you wore when you did an interview with _Jimmy Kimmel_?"

"Yep."

" _I can wear it_?!"

Annabeth smiles. "If you want."

Piper grins. "Thank you, thank you, thank you! You're a lifesaver, and my best friend, and I love you."

Annabeth chuckles. "Love you too, Pipes."

Piper smiles slyly. "So … where's Mr. Gold Medal taking you?"

A smile starts spreading on Annabeth's lips, much to her opposing attempts. "He's making me dinner at his place."

Piper grins. "Ooo," she says, "how romantic. Candle light dinner at his place." She wiggles her eyebrows suggestively.

Annabeth scoffs and rolls her eyes. "Shut up. It won't even be candle light."

"How do you know?"

Annabeth smiles. "Just shut up, it's not gonna be like that. It's our third date, Piper, nothing's gonna happen."

Piper shrugs. "All I'm saying is that I kissed Jason on our _second_ date."

Annabeth snorts. "Yeah, and you kissed Dean on your _first_ date."

Piper picks a shoe from the closet and throws it at Annabeth. "It was a movie date, you can't blame me for that!"

Annabeth laughs. "Sure, I can."

Piper holds back a smile, but it peeks out anyway. "I hate you."

"No, you don't."

"Yeah, I don't."

* * *

Annabeth is left to get ready for her date all by herself.

She doesn't worry too much about what she's wearing because, yeah, okay, it's Valentine's Day, and, whatever, this is possibly the first uber romantic date she's having with her boyfriend (although, that's never been made clear; this _is_ their third date, after all), but she doesn't want to come off as someone who, perhaps, is hoping something is going to happen.

And just like that, Piper is in her head.

Annabeth really likes Percy, which is sort of the problem. Because he's almost perfect, aside from how ununderstanding he is about the world of ice cream flavors every tub of vanilla has to offer. But she doesn't want to come off as 'asking for it', you know? But then again, she also doesn't want to push him away? It's all too systematic and anxiety-driven, but it's stuck in her head.

But, seriously. She really likes him. A lot.

The annoying part is her soulmate. The other day, he had written something over his arm and tried to wipe it off, maybe? But it didn't work very well. The ink was smudged all over her forearm and she couldn't read what it said, but, then again, that's not the part that matters.

He, her soulmate, had ignored her for over a week, probably more, and then when he does write something, he does a pretty poor attempt at getting rid of it.

She tries not to think about it too much, but in the end, whatever's bugging her in the back of her mind always wins.

To distract herself, thirty minutes before Percy had asked Annabeth to come over, she's in front of the t.v. watching a baking show. The girl on screen is making a giant top hat out of cake for Abraham Lincoln's birthday. Annabeth is so worried about the whole thing toppling over that she forgets all the anxiety's that were previously clogging her mind.

And then there's the note. _Help me i don't know what to make for dinner_

Shockingly, it's from her soulmate. The one who hadn't bothered to acknowledge her for a few weeks. That one.

Of course, in the midst of her shock (she was reaching for the remote and then: bam, there it is), she ignores all alarm bells and sensible thoughts, and grabs the pen sitting on the counter.

 _Going on a date?,_ she writes, as if he didn't totally ignore her for days on end. Honestly, one day she'll sober up and understand that she doesn't have to stand for being mistreated, that she should defend herself. But, then again, today is not that day.

It takes him a minute to respond, but eventually, he writes, _no but Im hungry and have to cook, also I only have thirty minutes_

 _Order a pizza_

 _I cant_

 _Why not?_

 _Proper etiquette and many websites point to not ordering a pizza_

 _Spaghetti_

 _You like italian?_

 _If I dont have to make it_

 _Thank you and also Im sorry for everything but I have to go and make spaghetti_

Maybe today is the day. Well, the day that she'll understand. Tomorrow she'll confront him. Maybe.

If he even responds.

As Annabeth scrubs her arms free of any ink or marker, getting rid of all evidence she even has a soulmate, she finally accepts her reality with him.

They were never meant to be, Annabeth and Him (her soulmate, not God). Maybe in another universe, possibly. But growing a relationship with someone over quick conversations written on your arm isn't the best way to meet someone you're supposed to spend the rest of your life with.

Annabeth needs consistency. She needs routine. Spontaneity is foreign and uncomfortable. Annabeth needs _commitment_.

If her soulmate has taken this long to semi-comfortably talk to, then is it worth it? Yes, she's still very young, and yes, she has her whole life ahead of her, but does she want to spend most of it chasing after a guy she's barely talked to?

Absolutely not.

Percy, on the other hand, actually lives down the hall.

Though, it may not be the healthiest way to lead a relationship, it is convenient, to say the least. And her and Percy have been on two dates, nearly three, which is three times more than she's been on with her soulmate.

Unless late night chats that lead to early mornings and rough afternoons count.

It doesn't, Annabeth tells herself, shoving her sleeves down. And, you know what? Who cares that Percy's not her soulmate, Annabeth likes him anyway. (Even though he called her Beth, but that was one time. She'll have to tell him how much she hates nicknames, though that can wait for the fourth or fifth date.)

And don't even try to tell her that relationships with people who're not your soulmate don't work. She already knows that.

But Jason and Piper are happy; very happy. Would it be so bad to let herself be happy for a change? Annabeth strives for nothing but greatness, but for once, maybe the greatness can wait, so she can go eat some homemade food made by a very cute, nice, swimmer kid who likes her just as much as she likes him. Yeah, that sounds good.

Finding herself at Percy's door, Annabeth sings along to Queen's Somebody to Love in her head, which, while being a great song, is completely coincidental and ironic that it got stuck in her head.

It _is_ a great song, though.

She bounces on her heels a few times, glances down the hallway, looks at her wrist and realising she doesn't own a watch, checking her phone clock, and once again, glancing down the hall, but this time, at her own door. It's so tempting for her to just run back and jump on the couch.

After a few more moments of contemplation, Annabeth has a sudden smack-in-the-face-realisation that leaves her feeling completely stupid.

She forgot to knock.

She knocks.

Lo and behold, literal seconds later, Percy opens the door with a smile on his face. Immediately, she smells garlic and a variety of other seasonings coming from his kitchen.

The two stare at each other for a few moments, neither having saying anything. To an outsider, it might look really awkward, but Annabeth gets a little caught up in _blatantly staring at him_ to realise it might be getting awkward.

"Uh, I brought you this," she says, holding up the bottle of wine she's been holding for a few solid minutes now.

It started as a joke, the wine did. Piper bought it to make fun of Annabeth and her 'romantic, yet nothing's-gonna-happen-date'. Jokes on Piper, though, because Annabeth did put the wine to good use. Which ended up being exactly what Piper was making fun of her for. Fantastic.

Percy looks nervous for a few moments as he says, "Oh, well, you didn't have to, but thanks. Otherwise we would've had to drink water." Annabeth smiles.

"Think of it as my thanks. So, thanks for making dinner and all that."

"Your being here is enough thanks," he responds slickly.

Annabeth takes a moment, because that was a whole hell of a lot smoother than she thought he was. "This is a third date, Percy, not a first."

He shrugs. "It's true. Anyway, come inside, please."

Even though she's been in the apartment before, Annabeth feels as though it's the first time she's seeing it. The first time she's noticing how much bigger it is than hers, despite living down the hall.

The smell of spices and seasonings gets stronger as Percy takes her into the kitchen. "Smells good," Annabeth compliments.

Percy smiles at her as he creates their plates.

Annabeth watches him move.

He's wearing a dark green sweater with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows (which is enough to make her heart soar); his hair is messy, too, as if he forgot to do it until the last minute, so he just ran his fingers through it until he deemed it nice enough. The low yellow kitchen lights makes his skin look so beautifully tan. So, along with a great personality, the guy's got looks too.

"I hope you like Italian," he says. "I wasn't sure what to make and my friend suggested spaghetti, so I _really_ hope you like Italian," he chuckles.

Annabeth's heart falls to her stomach.

Though incredibly unlikely, the odds are there, and it all makes _so much sense_ that she just feels stupid.

 _I have black hair_ , _he writes, green eyes, and I'm about average height._

 _Do you live in America?_

 _Very personal questions, he writes, Yes, I live in New York, actually._

"Hm?" she asks, begging her ears to be betraying her.

But he turns around anyway, holding two plates full of spaghetti, and on his left wrist, the letter _S_.

* * *

"You look really beautiful tonight, Piper, really," Jason compliments Piper from across the table, earning a blush and a small smile from her.

"You don't look too shabby yourself, Jason," she responds. She leans across the table, and instinctively, Jason does the same. Whispering, Piper says, "I really hope they don't check bags on the way out, because I already got eight breadsticks in here." She points to her purse which innocently hangs from the back of her chair.

Traditionally, really fancy restaurants would take a ladies purse and a gentleman's coat, but Piper absolutely refused. She secretly whispered to Jason as they were escorted to their table, "We live in New York. This is the most dangerous city to live in. And yeah, I leave my door unlocked, but I'm not giving my purse to a bunch of strangers." Jason had nodded in agreement.

"No way, Piper. Eight? That's a new record."

Piper nods. "I know. Maybe by tonight, I can fit three more, plus a wine glass. Sell it on eBay, perhaps?"

Jason silently laughs, hoping not to disturb the other couples around them. "That's the ideal plan."

The soft and low conversation in the elegant restaurant mingles with their own. Nobody, even within a close proximity, could assume they're talking about stealing breadsticks.

Piper takes a bite out of one of the breadsticks that is left on the table; she nearly chokes on it when her heart rate alarmingly increases. _No, please, not now. Not right now._

"Piper?" Jason asks, concerned. His voice sounds far away. "Are you okay?"

She looks up and meets his eyes. His beautifully similar blue eyes. "Uh, yeah," she responds, very flustered. The back of her neck is hot. She swallows. "I just need some water."

Jason nods in her peripheral vision as she takes a gulp of her water. The fact that it's only room temperature doesn't help in the slightest.

Piper looks up and scans the room, eyeing every face in front of her.

And then she sees him.

He's wearing a tux and helping an older couple to their table, asking about drinks. He's a waiter. Of course he's a waiter, he told her on their first (and only) date.

Dean looks up, which is just Piper's luck, and the soulmates' eyes meet from across the room. Jason says, "Piper?" but his voice is so muffled she might just be under water. And honestly, she'd rather be drowning than in that seat.

* * *

 **hello hello there**

 **so oh wow im so sorry but honestly? not really because i am evil and love torturing my readers.**

 **(so didn't get into legally blonde at school and im all sad about that but i mean during the dance audition my glasses betrayed me and flew halfway across the stage so im really not surprised just disappointed? i guess)**

 **anyway**

 **on to the positive side of things!**

 **annabeth knows percy is her soulmate now! bum bum BUUUUUUUUMMMMMMM and piper runs into her real soulmate on a date with jason! bum bum BUUUUUUUUUUUMMMMMM.**

 **oh boy whats going to happen**

 **well i know what will happen.**

 **but anyway, next friday we shall finally have our long awaited answers and AHHHHHHHHHhhh im so excited**

 **can we please just talk about how freaking epic Aphrodite is? i mean there's all this talk about annabeth and percy and how cooooooool and how anticipated their relationship is but my girl the Goddess of Love is out here learning everyone on the subject of luuuuuvvvvvv.**

 **sorry i might actually be in love with aphrodite but i mean who isn't**

 **anyway i larb you all and i hope you guys have a fantabulous friday! and a wonderful weekend! (and for those in america i know you all get tuesday off for election day so enjoy that you fiends!)(just kidding i love you)**

 **xoxLeigh**


	16. Chapter 16

Chapter Sixteen

" _Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same." -Emily Bronte_

* * *

Annabeth holds her breath. "What did you do to your ankle?" she whispers hoarsely. She doesn't know why she asked that particular question, but it's already in the air.

Percy frowns. "I got twisted in my bed sheets, didn't I tell you-?"

"When?"

He pauses. "Last week, Friday, I think? Friday morning?"

Annabeth takes a deep breath. Her heart pounds. "Last week, Friday morning, I woke up with a sprained ankle."

Percy face is a mask of confusion. He realises he's still holding the plates of spaghetti and puts them down. "What are you talking about, Beth? I thought you said you twisted it while running?"

She meets his eyes. His glorious green eyes that contrast with his black hair. She really should've seen it. The yellow kitchen lights illuminate the freckles on his nose. If he'd stay still, Annabeth would take the time to count them.

"My name is Annabeth, not Beth," she tells him.

Percy freezes. His chest fills with panic and confusion. "Annabeth?" he breathes out. Her name is like a perfume, Percy understands as he says it; it's exotic, entrancing, and intoxicating-a gossamer veil of intrigue. "You're my soulmate," he says plainly.

"You're mine," she says back, staring into his bright eyes.

Percy's eyes flicker to her wrist. Annabeth rolls up her sleeve and tattooed is the letter 'S' for Sally. Their eyes meet. Percy steps forward. Two steps.

Then he kisses her.

"Piper, hi, how are you?" a man, around Jason's age, comes up to their table. He has dark brown, shabby hair and wears a waiter's uniform. His name tag says Dean.

Piper smiles tightly. "Good, thanks." Jason can see the waves of uncomfort and nervousness roll off her.

"Hi," Jason interrupts. "I'm Jason. You are?"

Dean turns around. "I'm Dean."  
Jason nearly chokes. Dean's mismatched eyes matched Piper's. Her soulmate.

"What the _hell_ , Piper," Dean says through gritted teeth, moving his attention. "You're my soulmate, and you're on a date with Superman?"

Jason evaluates the fact that this guy clearly doesn't know what Superman looks like.

Sensing the change in atmosphere, Jason stands. "Hey, man, let's leave her alone, alright?"

Dean turns on him. "How 'bout you leave us alone, Point Break? This doesn't concern you."

Jason considers giving Dean a solid black eye, but he looks down at Piper and sees her almost hyperventilating, so he shoulders Dean aside and helps her stand. "Let's go, alright?" She only nods, but tears nearly fall from her eyes.

As they walk out, half the restaurant watching them, Dean yells, "You may like him now, sweetheart, but we're _soulmates._ We're inevitable. Ryan Gosling will only be there for so long."

Piper stumbles, but Jason wraps an arm around her waist. Together, they leave.

* * *

Knowing that Annabeth and Percy are in Jason's apartment, Piper suggests they go to her flat. Jason agrees.

They sit in silence on the couch for a while. Piper turns on the t.v.. A baking channel is on, the lady talks about how she should've added stilts to her Abraham Lincoln cake because it toppled over.

Piper feels tears burning her eyes. She doesn't want to cry in front of Jason. "I need to do laundry," she says. "Feel free to stay here, I'm sure Annabeth won't be home for while, and I'll be back soon."

Jason sits up. "Are you sure? I can come with you-"

"No, I'm fine. It's just laundry."

After grabbing all the dirty laundry both her and Annabeth have accumulated over the past while, Piper heads downstairs. She still wears her beautiful deep blue dress, though she took her shoes off a while ago.

Her mind is blank and staticky as she goes into the laundry room. Piper curses under her breath, since another person sat on top of a machine on one side of the room. She recognizes him as Nico, Jason's cousin.

Piper quietly puts her darks in the washing machine. She pours her soap and puts it in with her fabric softener. She attempts to put in a quarter, but fails because of the tears that blur her vision. They fall, and Piper leans on her elbows on the machine, burying her head in her hands.

She cries quietly for a moment until a hand takes the quarter from her and puts it in the machine. She hears him turn the dial and press the button. The washing machine starts. Piper looks up at Nico who looks at her with sympathy. "Who is it?" he asks.

Minutes later, they're both sitting on top of whirring machines, Piper has stopped crying though she holds a tissue. "I was on a date with Jason. Super fancy place, nice bread-sticks. But my heart started beating like how it does when you're with your soulmate, and I look up and of course there he is. Dean, my soulmate, a freaking waiter." She sniffles and laughs bitterly. "He came over and just- He started a scene and Jason got me out, but as we were leaving, Dean said something that fucked my mind a bit. And now I'm contemplating my entire relationship with Jason. I mean, he's not my soulmate, but I love him, and I really see us going somewhere, but he's just- not my soulmate." She pauses.

"My friend Annabeth's parents aren't soulmates," she says. "They're such a mess. They hate each other, but haven't gotten a divorce because of some reason I'll never get. They treated Annabeth like she was their servant instead of their daughter. I don't want to end up like them. I love Annabeth, but I don't want that. I don't want Dean, though."

Nico nods. "Can I tell you something, Piper?"

Piper nods.

"I'm not with Will because he's my soulmate. I'm with him because I love him, because he brought me light into my life that I'd never seen before. Every time I see him, I'm happy. And we fight, too, Piper. Soulmates aren't perfect, believe me." Nico pauses. "What I'm trying to say is that love is difficult. I know. I'm gay," he chuckles. "People have hated me and cursed me to hell for being gay. But I still love Will. So if people hate you and curse you to hell for loving someone who's not your soulmate, then forget about them. And go date my cousin."

Piper chuckles. She gets off the machine. "Thank you, and hey, watch my laundry for me? I probably won't be back for a while."

Nico blanks. "No, hey, Piper, I'm not gonna do your laundry-"

But she's already gone.

* * *

Annabeth can't even come to describe what it's like to kiss her soulmate.

Unlike overused cliches like to say, there aren't fireworks. But, yes, it's earth-shattering. And yes, she is just so completely _taken_ that the rest of the world disappears to white noise.

She simply _melts._

It also doesn't help that he's such a good kisser, _woah_.

They just- fit together. Everything does. His hands go to her face, and hers to his.

It's nothing like her first kiss with Travis in freshman year.

(It was during homecoming, they were both dancing to Shut Up and Dance With Me in the school gym. Annabeth told him she needed air and he followed. They wandered to the football field and kissed on the bleachers. He tasted like chapstick and gum and neither of them knew what to do with their hands, or lips for that matter.)

Anyway.

This kiss; this kiss is something. It feels so natural, like they've done it a hundred times, but it's sweet, innocent, and all around loving, if she's being honest, like a first kiss should be.

Annabeth can't deny that she's kissed her fair share of guys before, but this one with Percy is simply different. Maybe because she's (not, but definitely is) in love, or maybe because he's her soulmate.

But, of course, she's not complaining.

Annabeth lets her hands slide from his face to his arms and she pulls away from the kiss. Percy rests his forehead against hers. Both their eyes glitter as they stare at one another.

They're so smitten.

Annabeth watches as their hands intertwine (probably by magic, or force of nature; she certainly wasn't doing it) and wonders what the hell just happened (she can't seem to care, though; it happened and she kind of really wants to do it again). She sees her 'S' tattoo and his 'S' tattoo.

It's true then, she thinks. He really is the perfect guy.

"Hi," Percy says, his heart eyes showing. Annabeth is sure hers are too, but, hey, what can you do.

"Hey," she whispers back. They both lean in to kiss again, but it's kind of difficult because they're smiling so wide. They pull away and breathlessly laugh at themselves.

The grin that spreads on both their faces can be described as nothing but unconditional happiness.

* * *

Piper wouldn't describe it as a 'waltz', perhaps it's more of a 'march'. Or maybe a 'storm', but she's not angry, so, yeah, a 'march'.

Piper marches back into the apartment, where Jason sits on the couch, watching the same baking channel (though now the baker is crying because not only did her cake fall over, but the delivery service didn't send the cake to the right address), and nearly falling asleep. "Jason," Piper states. Quite loudly, too, Jason is so startled he almost falls off the couch.

"Oh, hey," he says, half-awake. "How was laundry?"

"I love you," she says, very clear.

For a few seconds there's complete silence from the two occupants in the room. (Though the lady on t.v. starts making a new cake.)

" _What_?" Jason asks, now fully alert. He stands and stumbles to Piper (his head may be awake but his legs are still asleep). "Piper, you can't-"

"Yes, Jason, I can." Piper takes a deep breath and looks into Jason's eyes. In the darkness of the room, his eyes are bright. "I don't care that Dean's my soulmate. I love _you_. And even though you'll probably go blind because you don't wear your glasses and your socks never match and you absolutely suck at driving and I'll more than likely never win an argument with you because you're a lawyer, and you're so lame because you still live with your cousins and you eat Lucky Charms for breakfast and you text me, like, a million times a day because you see really fat birds stealing tortilla chips from restaurants that have outdoor patios which are so ridiculous, by the way. And now I can't even remember what I was saying before, but, Jason, I love you for all those things. There are other reasons, too, but I love you, and I want to be with you."

Jason pauses. He's never had someone claim their love for him in a giant speech that simultaneously calls him out as a huge nerd.

"I love you, too," he says, "I also don't care that Dean's your soulmate either."

Piper laughs, possibly a bit too much, but she doesn't care.  
And then she kisses the man she loves.

Her soul's mate.

* * *

 **hello hello there**

 **so this is my last prewritten chapter! which means i have a lot of writing to do before next friday lol.**

 **also i watched the last five years over the weekend so all those songs are stuck in my head now**

 **iiiiim still huURTING**

 **freaking jamie i mean come on**

 **anyway**

 **have a great weekend, i know most of us get monday off which is uuuuber exciting! LETS GO NO SCHOOL NOVEMBER! its the one month a year im not overly stressed**

 **except i have so many tests so the stress is still here, but its stocking me in the corner while i at least have my monday off**

 **anyWAY. i hope you guys liked this chapter! annabeth and percy are so freaking cute and so are piper and jason, but in their own cute way.**

 **i wish you good days forEVER!**

 **xxLeigh**


	17. Chapter 17

Chapter Seventeen:

" _Death will come and will have your eyes-_

 _That you are life and you are nothingness._

 _Death has a look for everyone._

 _Death will come and will have your eyes._

 _It will be like renouncing a vice,_

 _Like seeing a dead face reappear in the mirror,_

 _Like listening to a lip that's shut._

 _We'll go down into the maelstrom mute."_

" _Death Will Come" Cesare Pavese_

* * *

When Percy was eight, his mom and dad got a divorce.

Due to extensive tv show watching, Percy didn't have to ask what that meant, and he knew how bad it was. He knew it meant trouble.

When Percy was eight (and a half), he had to choose between his mom and dad in court.

He didn't want to choose. He wanted his parents together more than anything. His mom didn't want him to choose either. She wanted him to be happy and that's all. Percy didn't know what his dad wanted, because his dad never really talked to Percy. So when Percy was eight and a half, he chose his mom over his dad.

When Percy was fifteen, his dad emailed him.

Percy deleted it without reading it.

When Percy was sixteen, his mom made him go to the family reunion his dad invited him to. Sally didn't come. "They're not my family," she had said.

He reunited with his cousins there, and they became lifelong friends. He met his crazy aunts and uncles. He saw his dad, too. But neither of them made a move to talk to each other.

When Percy was seventeen, his mom was diagnosed with cancer.

Brain cancer, too. The scariest kind. Percy emailed his dad and his dad never responded.

When Percy was eighteen, he forgot about his dad because he didn't matter anymore.

When he was eighteen, his mom started losing her hearing and she had to get hearing aids. When he was eighteen, she started forgetting things, too. Small things at first. Like how she keeps a bowl for her keys by the door, or her sisters birthday. But eventually Sally couldn't leave the house without Percy because she forgot how to drive and forgot where the grocery store was. When Percy was eighteen, his mom hired Bennett, a sixteen year old high schooler who volunteers at the hospital, to drive her everywhere.

And now Percy is twenty, and he has to say goodbye to his mom.

It's hard to get out of bed, knowing what waits for him outside the comfort of his blankets. It's hard to face the sun when he knows the light will be ripped from him soon. It's impossible to say goodbye to his cousins, knowing they said their farewells yesterday and today is his turn. It's difficult to drive to his mom's apartment, knowing this is the last time he'll ever come here, knowing a nice family will be moving in next week.

Percy just hugs his mom when he sees her and, shamelessly, he cries.

He remembers trying out for the swim team in his freshman year. He remembers going to intramurals and trying his hardest, staying in the pool after everyone's left and practicing his strokes until his entire body pruned. He remembers finding a note in his lunch box. _I love you! Good luck at tryouts, I know you'll get it. Love, mom_. He remembers pushing himself as hard as he could at tryouts, paying attention to his form and forgetting the other swimmers. He remembers not making the team. Percy remembers crying on his mom's shoulders and feeling so pathetic. He remembers her saying, " _When I was young, all the other girls wanted to grow up and get married. They wanted an army of kids, I remember. I just didn't know if that's what I wanted. Not because of responsibilities or giving birth or none of that. I just didn't want this. Seeing my baby cry, seeing you so upset… it breaks my heart. I love you so much, Percy, don't forget that."_ Percy remembers pulling back and seeing his mom's red eyes, her face so scrunched, he couldn't tell if she was crying or if it was just him.

He remembers thinking that nothing could be worse than that.

And now Percy just hugs his mom tighter.

Her hair smells like rose shampoo and the apartment smells like coffee and she's standing on his toes and he's going to miss her so much.

The ride to the airport is agonizing for Percy. There is a suitcase packed in the trunk of his car and his mom has a backpack in her lap. The windows are rolled down, letting the cool early March air seep through, soft music plays from the radio and his mom hums softly when she thinks she recognizes a song. He should be calm and cool and collected, but he's about to go say goodbye to his mom forever.

When Percy was learning to drive, of course, his mom taught him. Once when they were coming home from the grocery store, she stopped when they neared the apartment building and said, "You wanna drive?" Obviously, he said yes. He had caught on to the basics pretty quickly (" _Ten and two.. Mirrors, mirrors, mirrors… don't touch that petal ever… yes, this is drive… wait, don't change gears unless your foot is on the break, Percy, remember that please, you'll ruin my transmission, sweetheart_."), but the actual foot-on-petal-moving part threw him off a little bit. First he went too fast, then too slow, and then he slammed on the breaks way too hard. But the windows were rolled down and it was November, right before his half-birthday when he would sign up for his permit test, a cool breeze was easing its way through the opened windows. And every time he'd mess up, his mom would laugh and correct him, retelling plenty of stories about how she was _much_ worse when she was learning.

Percy also remembers years and years before that, when he was eleven. His cousins, Nico and Jason, had come over for Christmas and they were all playing at the park. Sally had left for the bathroom for not two minutes when Jason suggested they steal her car and drive to Vegas, not that he'd really know what to do there. Nico strongly disagreed, saying they should _not_ go to Vegas, but perhaps California, where it's summer all year. They didn't get to either of those places, the farthest they ended up was smashed against a tree. Thankfully, none of them were injured, but Nico claimed to have broken his chin (" _It really hurts, Aunt Sally!_ ") and Percy smacked his head so hard on the steering wheel, it scarred.

Now he's twenty, and he's driving his mom to the airport, and in an hour, maybe, or two, he'll never see her again.

At the airport, Sally gets pretzels from a small gift shop and after plenty of security checks, they wait in her gate for three minutes until, "Plane B-133 will be boarding now. Plane B-133 is boarding now."

They both stand at the same time and Percy looks down at his mom, tears in her eyes. "I-I'm so sorry, Percy." He hugs her tightly and forces himself to keep it together. It's almost like he's numb, like he doesn't feel anything at all. Not the shake of his mom's shoulders beneath him or the ground under his feet. "I shouldn't have done this to you, I'm so sorry."

Percy squeezes his eyes shut. "No, mom," he says shakily. "You want this, remember? It's okay, too. I'll be okay. Don't worry about me, please."

His heart is begging her to stay and his head is scrambled, but somehow he manages to keep himself together. He really doesn't want her to leave, but he knows a part of life is loss, but right now he'd rather like to play a different game.

Sally pulls away and puts Percy's head in her hands. She's shaking terribly. "I love you, you know that? And- and I'm so proud of the man you've become. You're a big kid now, Percy. So, you- you win me a gold medal, alright? And you marry that Annabeth for me, she'll be good for you, I know it." She smiles and takes a shaky breath. "Goodbye.. sweetheart."

She kisses his forehead right as the announcement calls, "Last call for anyone boarding Plane B-133. Last call, Plane B-133."

His mom turns around and rolls her suitcase with her. She hands the flight attendant her ticket and turns to Percy. She gives him her most winning smile, the best she can muster, and turns to leave.

And she's gone.

He doesn't know how long he stands there.

His phone is sitting on the seat behind him and anyone could walk up to him and take it, but he's barely conscious of anything at this point. He never even considered that he could be recognized by some crazy Aphrodite watcher, but he's barely conscious of anything at this point. He sees the plane take off from the window and a flight attendant had come up and asked him if he's okay, but he's barely conscious of anything at this point.

Percy remembers the first time he went away to summer camp.

He was nine, it was a science camp. It only lasted three days, but as soon as he got to his little cabin, he broke down into tears in his bunk. One of the other boys in his group, Grover, asked him what was the matter, they were in Maine! How cool! They're gonna build bottle rockets and make volcanoes and dissect squids and go on cool ziplines! How could Percy be upset when they have so many awesome things in store?

"I miss my mom," he had whispered to Grover in the darkness of his bunk.

And Grover had understood.

Baking soda volcanoes and dead squid intestines may sound wicked cool, but right in that moment, Percy just missed his mom.

He still does.

The first time Percy was left alone in the apartment without his mom, she had had a shift at the candy store she worked at that lasted long after Percy came home from school. He was thirteen and he made microwave mac and cheese, got the mail, did his dishes, done his homework, and lived to tell about it.

His mom had told him that she would be back after he'd gone to bed, but he stayed up suuuuper late (like ten o'clock!) to tell her how grown up he was.

She listened with the biggest smile on her face.

The car doesn't smell like her rose perfume or the coffee she drank that morning when Percy gets in it. The windows are rolled down so it smells like an airport car park.

There's a pain in his chest like someone shoved a nail in his heart and pinned it to his lungs. He can't breathe properly.

His mom is on a plane. She's off to Greece. There's optimism in her heart and a tumor in her brain and he knows she's been losing her ability to see colors and there's a pain in her left knee so she wears a brace on it now.

And Percy's in his car. Sitting still in the stale air. Workers are bustling with carts filled with suitcases and plenty of cars are fighting for parking spots. He has a pin in his heart and en emptiness in his head like a section of his brain was scooped out with a pumpkin carver.

He can't drive.

He calls Nico to come get him because if he tried to drive himself home he'd end up in the back of an ambulance. A part of him knows he shouldn't have come alone in the first place. A part of him knew it would be like this.

Nico gets there in an Uber in less than five minutes.

He doesn't ask, but he doesn't say anything. They drive home quietly.

When Percy was fourteen, his grandpa died.

Percy didn't know him that well, but death is something that oozes grief into those most unsuspecting. Percy didn't cry at the funeral, but he did find himself staring at the casket as it was lowering into the ground, wondering how a person could be alive one day and dead the next. He threw a white rose into the grave just as everybody did and felt his heart turnto lead, his shoulders sagging from the weight. He may have not known his grandpa that well, but someone did and he was gone. Percy wondered whose funeral he'd be visiting next.

Back in his apartment, Percy fell right asleep in the coldness of his room. The building's heating system hadn't been working for well over a week and with it being the beginnings of March, it's cold.

At sixteen, Percy and Sally had many times when the heater would shut off. On January 30th, Sally's birthday, it was particularly cold. Percy had woken up with no feeling in his toes. It was the last time he'd ever fallen asleep without socks on. Sally had suggested making cookies. It was their favorite thing to do together and, as she had convinced him, the oven would heat up their apartment so nicely.

Sally was wearing two scarves and Percy had his thickest raincoat zipped up, but they made their cookies. The oven trick only worked when it was on, really, but the warm blue batter and gooey chocolate chips had made the cold ten times more bearable. They watched Nightmare Before Christmas because it was one of Sally's all time favorite movies and shared a blanket on the couch.

The cold had come back that night, as it does tonight, as Percy sleeps soundly and tries to prepare himself for the rest of his life.

Cookies can surely help smother cold fingertips, but the chill always comes back, and Sally had taken the warmth with her. Even under his warm blankets, Percy will have to come out and face the cold eventually, and his mom won't be there to lend an extra pair of gloves.

Death does have a look for everyone, and Death is cold; very, very cold.

 _We'll go down into the maelstrom mute._

* * *

 **hello hello there**

 **first of all: im so sorry? but it was coming and you guys had to've known that.**

 **secondly, i apologize for not uploading last week, if i'm going to be honest, i didn't even have this chapter done by then, but i'm here now! woo!**

 **third, to my lovely american followers, happy thanksgiving to you all! (fun fact: i used to live in america until my family and i moved to stormy london only a few years back, so technically i am american, buuuuuuuuuut...) anywho, i am eternally grateful for all my wonderful readers, you guys give me the utmost motivation to write and to think of ideas for this story and others to follow! i am thankful for this beautiful community we share on , it is amazing how we can all bond and share our mutual love for stories and this crazy amazing book series. i can't even tell you how many fantastic people i've met on this site because of our love for writing and reading.**

 **i love you all so much and im thankful for all your kind and wonderful words each and every day! i shall see you next friday!**

 **\- Leigh**


	18. Chapter 18

Chapter Eighteen

" _I've seen the world, done it all; Had my cake now; Diamonds, brilliant, and Bel Air now; Hot summer nights, mid-July; When you and I were forever wild; The crazy days, city lights; The way you'd play with me like a child._

 _Will you still love me when I'm no longer young and beautiful? Will you still love me when I got_ _ **nothing but my aching soul**_ _? I know you will, I know you will, I know that you will. Will you still love me when I'm no longer beautiful?" -_ Young and Beautiful _by Lana Del Rey_

* * *

(Five-ish years later)

"Annabeth, you look beautiful and you're such an inspiration to me and my son."

Annabeth looks at Piper in the mirror, who's standing against the wall behind her scrolling through her phone. "Has anyone ever told you that you're a brilliant motivator?"

Piper nods, but doesn't look up. "They say 'monotone' and 'expressionless' is the best way to get your message across."

Annabeth shakes her head with a smile and caps her lipstick. She puts the tube down with shaky hands and turns around to Piper in the spinny chair. (Not eight minutes ago were they trying to see how fast they could spin Nico in it.) "I don't think I've even been this nervous," Annabeth admits, she tries to smile, but her stomach whirls and she reaches her cold hand to her hot forehead.

Piper pockets her phone and says seriously, "There's no reason to be, Beth." She smiles. "You'll do great. Nico, Jason, Clarence, and I will be watching from the audience in total support because we all love you."

Annabeth sighs. "Please don't call your son Clarence."

"Why? That's his name."

"We both know his name is Tom."

"He likes being called Clarence."

"And I like being called Annabeth yet nobody really listens to me."

But Piper just smiles. She pushes herself off the wall and comes over for a hug. Annabeth wraps her arms around Piper and sighs again. "What if they ask me something totally vulgar?"

Piper laughs. "What could they possibly ask that would be too vulgar for you?"

Annabeth pinches her side. "I don't know! Percy said someone might ask if I've ever imagined them naked. I have no idea what I would say if someone asks that."

Piper shrugs. "Just scream for security."

Annabeth rolls her eyes even though Piper can't see her. "Right, because as soon as someone even mentions nudity, I'm gonna start screaming to get them out and forever be known as the author who went entirely too crazy after writing her book for five years."

"It's an effing great book."

"Thank you," Annabeth says, pulling herself from the hug. She checks her watch. "It's time."

Piper smiles and tucks a piece of hair behind Annabeth's ear. "I believe in you. And so does Nico and Jason and my Tommy."

"And Percy."

Piper says, "Well that goes without saying." Annabeth smiles. "Lets go."

There's quite a journey from the green room to the actual stage. There were at least three teenage interns with serious looks and headsets, pointing them in the same direction every four steps they took. Plenty of wires to jump over, mirrors to triple check that that one curl stays in place, breaths to take, words of luck to chant over and over again, and at the end of it all Annabeth finds herself in a wing just behind the eyes of the audience. Piper squeezes her hand, kisses her cheek, and leaves out of the side door to find her seat.

The announcer on stage sits by himself in a blue chair talking through a microphone to the audience. There's one more blue chair right across from him with another microphone on the arm, Annabeth's chair. Under all those lights, in front of all those people, and all their questions. Between the two chairs is a giant poster of the front cover of Annabeth's new book. _Her_ book. _Her_ words. _Her_ creation.

She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath.

This morning Percy made her coffee before she woke up, and while half of her believes he only did it so she could tell the wondering listeners that her beloved sweetly made her coffee, she knows it was to show his love because he's not here to support her right now.

He's actually at a meet. A huge one, too; important. Not the real-deal-Olympics, but close. There's a big trophy and a lot of money riding on how fast that boy can swim. It's just ironic how it happened to be on the same day of Annabeth's first panel on her book tour.

Yeah. _Book tour._

She wrote a full book and sold enough copies to land her a country wide tour to promote it.

Granted, half of those sales were from her friends who each bought at least a couple hundred copies, but she didn't care. Some people still bought it.

Annabeth's never done a panel like this, though. On her last book she did manage to snag a t.v. interview with Jimmy Kimmel and two years ago when her and Percy finally went public about their relationship she caved and did an interview with Aphrodite (but, okay, the woman was technically harassing her into it; there were probably hundreds of emails about it and even more twitter messages and people stopping her on the street, but whatever, she might've had a lot of fun, shut up. They drank tea and Aphrodite even asked her about her last book, sue her for enjoying that.)

But this one is different. Now it's not just the interviewer, it's the audience, too. The readers. The people who made thirst tweets about her sweetest characters or even her worst villains. The teenagers who made blogs and wrote fanfiction about her main couple; drew fanart of her books' best moments. The people who bought three copies. The people who cried when Annabeth signed all of them. The people who make playlists based off chapters or characters or settings. The people who laughed and cried and stayed up into the early minutes of the morning to read her book.

Her book. Annabeth's.

They are asking the questions.

And she's scared.

"Please give a warm welcome to the one and only, the brilliant and the beautiful, the author of this fantastic creation: Ms. Annabeth Chase!"

And does the crowd scream.

It's deafening and for a moment Annabeth just feels her heart race and hears the shouts from the audience before she realises she's on. They just get louder as she walks on stage.

The announcer, David Little, hugs Annabeth in greeting as the crowd goes simply wild. She takes her seat just as David does and picks up her microphone. For the first time, the crowd still clapping and yelling _her_ name, Annabeth looks out to them.

And, _holy crap_ , there's so many.

They're all screaming for her. For her book and her words. They paid money for this. For her. For Annabeth. There are people waving t-shirts and holding up their signed copy of her book. Funnily enough, she recognizes a few people in the front row from the signing earlier and she waves to them, they lose it a little and she laughs, something going unheard under yelling of the crowd.

People are wearing shirts with quotes from her book, things she wrote, some have art they drew of her characters; it's all enough to make her cry.

She's worked on this darn book for so long and seeing how much they love and appreciate the effort and time she put into it warms her heart so much.

The moment lasts only a few seconds and the crowd quiets a bit. After just a little more searching, Annabeth finds Piper, Jason, Nico, and little Tommy in Piper's lap. Piper waves his hand to her and Nico grins while pointing to Jason's shirt which is one that's being sold at entry. It's a black t-shirt with the words 'I am real' printed very small in white letters on the front; it's a quote from her book, her favorite quote. Annabeth's heart clenches.

The interviewer smiles at her and says into his microphone, "So, Annabeth Chase, how are you today?"

Annabeth would give him a bright smile, but she hasn't stopped grinning since she stepped on the stage so she just holds the microphone to her mouth and tells him, "I'm actually feeling very good. I'm very nervous, don't get me wrong, but I'm excited."

He smiles and nods. "I take it you've had a good day so far?"

Annabeth's smile turns into a slight smirk. _This one's for you, you big banana._ "I mean, it's been a pretty stressful day, what with getting ready and all, but my wonderful boyfriend brought me a cup of coffee this morning, so my day started pretty nice."

The crowd cheers at the mention of Percy, like Annabeth knew they would. She's starting to feel a little less nervous, her heart still beats heavy in her chest, but her hands aren't shaking as bad anymore.

She says into the microphone, "How've you been, David?"

David smiles oddly, like he's surprised she's asking him anything at all. "I'm doing well, thank you for asking." He turns to the audience. "Let's get some questions from the people now, yeah?"

There's two lines of people asking questions, one over David's shoulder and one over Annabeth's. The first person at the mic is a little girl with a copy of the book in her arms. Her mom takes the microphone from the stands and hands it to her so she can reach it. The crowd coos. "Hi," she says timidly.

Annabeth laughs, how can she be so cute? "What's your name?" David asks.

"Elizabeth."

He holds his arms as if asking the audience to say it with him: "Hello, Elizabeth!" the entire audience says.

David chuckles, "What's your question, Elizabeth?"

The girl shifts on her feet. "Um, who's your favorite character that you wrote in your story?"

Annabeth thinks for a moment. "Well, I really loved Heather-" the crowd cheers, Annabeth chuckles- "mainly because I based her strongly off of my best friend- slash- sidekick, Piper, who is sitting right there." Annabeth holds out her hand to Piper and Piper stands up, facing the audience and bows twice with little Tommy strapped to her chest in a baby carrier before sitting again. Annabeth shakes her head. "I think that I was probably married to Piper in one of my past lives, we've probably also been sisters, too. And at one point arch enemies. But she's been by my side through thick and thin. And she's one of the funniest people I've ever met so she makes for the perfect person to base a character after." Annabeth smiles, "Who's your favorite, Elizabeth?"

Elizabeth wastes no time in saying, "Shawn."

For reference: Shawn was the comic relief. The funny, go-lucky kinda guy. Annabeth might've based him off of a library store manager she once knew, but ask her specifically and she'll lie. In the end, though, Shawn was killed after accidentally misplacing a bomb, so he sacrificed himself to save his beautiful love, Heather. Annabeth got quite a lot of good-meaning fans ranting to her on twitter about how evil she was for killing him off.

The crowd explodes. She hears some sobs from her left and Annabeth laughs. David says, "Let's all have a moment of silence for Shawn Greenblatt."

Annabeth chuckles and says, "As evil as this might be, one of the first things I wrote down about this story was that Shawn would die."

There's an audible " _what?"_ from the front row as the crowd erupts in voices talking over each other. David says, "Oh, sorry, forgot to mention. If you haven't read the book yet, then you should excuse yourself in the hall and read it, then come back because this panel will be _full_ of spoilers."

Annabeth says, "Sorry," into her mic, but it's lost in the laughs of the crowd.

The next person is a teenage boy named Arthur (" _hello, Arthur!"_ ) who asks Annabeth what inspired her to write her novel. Annabeth takes a breath, thinking of her answer. "Well- I had a little period of time where I wasn't writing. I mean, I just had the biggest writer's block imaginable. I just- I did everything under the sun instead of writing. Including doing the whole falling in love with my soulmate thing-" the crowd woops- "but one day I just sat down with an empty document and wrote until the tips of my fingers hurt. It was well past three days without sleep when I finished." She smiles, remembering. "That short story was probably the worst thing I've ever written. Worse than the story I wrote in elementary school about my teacher sending her whole class into a maze of different colored doors with snakes behind them- worse than that.

"But there were a few things I liked," Annabeth says. "I liked how my main character wore his heart on his sleeve just like my boyfriend. I liked how one of the girls had more hilarious one-liners than most t.v. sitcoms do just like my best friend." Annabeth catches Piper's eye and they smile and each other. "I liked the little details. So I just took the good parts and turned it into what it is today. Granted, that process took just under five years, which was no easy feat." The crowd laughs.

Annabeth says, "My inspiration to write this wasn't the lack of writing I was doing. It wasn't the drive to have another book on my shelf with my name on it or to make more money. It wasn't like that. I wrote this book because I have a best friend who will stay up with me while I brainstorm the best ways to kill off the best character. I wrote this book because I have a boyfriend who made me coffee in bed this morning so that I could tell you guys that my boyfriend made me coffee in bed this morning." The crowd laughs. "I wrote this book because I have so many amazing people in my life that keep me going. They keep me sain- as hard as that is." She pauses and says, "My inspiration to write this book was to put into words: my life. It was a personal fictional journal, of sorts, that I shared with everyone else. Of course, I didn't have the love of my life die in a giant explosion." The crowd laughs with her. "I just wanted to write it down in a way that makes sense."

Arthur smiles and nods at Annabeth, retreating to his seat. David calls up the next questioner.

* * *

Percy's feet are cemented to the block, but the rest of his body is free. He rolls his shoulders twice, then sets his arms. He squeezes his shoulders against his ears tightly, left hand over his right. He leans forward, feeling the whole world tilt. The number three that labels his lane stares up at him. Closing his eyes, he takes a deep breath.

 _Think of Annabeth_.

The gun fires.

He dives.

Percy flies into the water, cutting the surface without a splash around him. The other swimmers are off too, but he doesn't pay attention to them. Through his goggles, he sees the floor below him and his arms fly out and forward without him having to tell them to move.

One stroke-

Two-

He comes up for air-

Quickly, he does a flip turn, hitting the wall strongly with his feet and pushing off fiercely.

Swimming is as easy as breathing for Percy. It's as fluid as walking and as mechanical as brushing his teeth. So when Percy pushes himself like this in a real competition, there's nothing that can stop him.

Annabeth can write, and damn Percy can swim.

He glides through two, three more strokes and the wall is under his fingertips. Percy surfaces and gasps for air, ripping the goggles and cap off his head. He looks to the scoreboard.

He's in first place by three milliseconds.

His coach is patting Percy's back and helping him out of the water. There's yelling coming from every direction. At this point, all the swimmers are done and their friends and families are hugging them- not even caring about their wet clothes. Percy looks around and even though he knows they're all at Annabeth's panel, he scans every face until he eventually settles with his coach.

Hedge tells him that next time he might want to envision himself "swimming into battle" and that might help him go faster.

"Coach," Percy says, "you do know I won, right?"

Hedge nods. "No- yeah, I knew that. I'm just saying."

Once he finds his towel, Percy looks through the faces again. _They're not here_ , he reminds himself, but by god, he just wants to hug somebody right now. He _won._ First effing place.

And then he sees Nico elbowing his way through the crowd of swimmers, Jason, Piper, and Annabeth all behind him.

If it isn't just the perfect day.

Percy wraps Nico in a nice, wet hug, much to his immediate protests, and Jason joins in too. A bro hug. Jason claps him on the back. "Nice win, Perce. Three milliseconds for the three musketeers!"

Nico grins. They're kind of like the ultimate holy trinity.

Piper steps in the circle with baby Tommy strapped to her chest. "You keep leaving out your son, Jason."

Percy steps forward to kiss Piper's cheek. "Congrats, by the way, Percy. I knew you'd win, you fish," Piper says.

"Thank you very much, Piper. I'll take that as a compliment." Percy asks, "Hey, Nico, where's Will?"

Nico points behind him. "He's keeping the car warm, but he wanted you to know how happy he is for you."

"He doesn't even know I won."

"Will is always happy," Nico brushes off.

And then Annabeth is rushing through them and Percy picks her up in a hug and he's so glad she's here and the nerves settle in his stomach, but he doesn't have to think about that now-

"You won!" she says, her eyes all bright.

"I did," Percy nods, his forehead rests against hers and he looks into her eyes. "Just for you."

Annabeth rolls her eyes. "Don't tease."

"What? I did!"

"You're already pushing it, being soaking wet and all. Do you _ever_ use a towel?"

Percy half shrugs. "I was planning on it."

"Stop being so gross!" Piper yells. "You're scarring my son."

Annabeth moves to Percy's side and he puts an arm over her shoulders. "Sorry, Piper," Nico says, "but you and Jason are so much worse."

"Look who's talking," Jason mutters.

Nico moves to kick him, but Percy says, "When did you guys even get here?"

"Just a few minutes ago," Annabeth says. "We were running in the parking lot to get here in time."

"Yeah," Piper says, Tommy's hand wrapped around her finger, "we missed the take off, but we saw you win."

"And that's all that matters," Jason adds.

"Also I got this ice cream sandwich," Nico says, holding up a melting ice cream sandwich that's dripping down to his elbow.

"When did you get that?" Percy asks.

"Like, four minutes ago. In the hallway," Nico says, licking the ice cream.

"You missed the beginning of my competition to get ice cream."

Piper says, "It's damn good ice cream," and swipes a lick of his ice cream sandwich.

"Don't curse in front of our son."

"Technically, I'm behind him."

"I'm so glad you made it," Percy says to Annabeth, tuning out the banter coming from the others.

Annabeth smiles warmly. "I wouldn't miss it."

And he thinks-

Maybe now-

He's won-

She's about to go on tour-

His friends are all there-

(and hopefully his mom is watching)

Is now a good time?

And it's too late to tell because he's already saying, "Hold on for a second, I need to get something from my bag," and curse his fingers for all of a sudden feeling numb and did he even say that to her or did he just walk away and goddamnit where did he put his bag and of course it's over on the benches and please fingers stop being so numb and then he's walking back to a smiling Annabeth and is he actually going to do this?

Yes, yes he is.

And he's on one knee.

"Oh my god," Piper whispers.

"Oh my god," Annabeth whispers.

He opens the box, the beautiful diamond gleaming in the sun from the high windows.

(was an indoor pool really the best place to do this?)

(now it has to be because he can't exactly start over another time.)

"Annabeth," Percy says and is Nico filming now? Or is that just a stranger? And is the entire room now deathly silent? Oh, god. "I, uh, probably should've thought about what I was going to say before I did this but-" Annabeth laughs breathlessly and are there tears in her eyes?- "I need you to know that I love you so much. I've loved you since probably middle school when you helped me cheat on all my math tests. I've loved you since we started dating five years ago and I'll love you for the rest of my life. I've never been much with words so I'll just get on with it-" Piper laughs- "Do wanna, maybe, marry me?"

But does he even have to ask? Because Annabeth has the biggest smile on her face and she hasn't ran away yet, so he takes that as a really good sign. She nods and whispers 'yes' and then throws herself at Percy and crushes him in the tightest hug and he forgets for a moment that he just got out of the pool and he kisses her like it's their first: full of love and plenty of hope. He hears cheers and clapping and is that Piper sobbing? But it all fades away because _she said yes_. And he pulls away for a second to shove the ring on probably the wrong finger because she's shaking so much and he doesn't really know which finger it's supposed to go on, but then she just hugs him again and all he thinks, all he knows, and all he loves is _Annabeth_.

And nothing else has to matter, does it?

(Are you watching, mom? I'm gonna marry her. I love her and I always will. Sorry for using your engagement ring, but I think it's being put in better use now. I love you.)

* * *

 **hello hello there**

 **first of all: i'm sorry?**

 **i know i was gone for definitely over a month or two? but i'm here now and i'm sorry? also THIS IS NOT THE END. i have one more chapter although i don't know when it's coming out.**

 **fun fact: i have restarted this chapter about twelve times. i finished it like eight minutes ago.**

 **lots of things are happening in my life, both personal and school is starting up on monday which is never fun.**

 **i literally just realized that today is a saturday. I was so excited too, I thought i got this chapter finished on friday but sadly, I did not.**

 **i really hope you guys enjoyed this chapter, please let me know what you think. next chapter will take place a little while later wink wink. let me tell you- i loved this chapter so much. writing it was so much fun and once i sat down and told myself to write it, it maybe took a week to finish, so i'm so sorry for the long absence, but life, you know?**

 **(and if you remember all those authors notes ago, i wrote about dear evan hansen, well ya girl is going to see the musical on the 19th! im so excited! it was one of my christmas presents from my parents and wow i'm excited, ive said that a couple times now.)**

 **(also if you're hardcore you might remember how i talked about that boy at the halloween party? he asked me out on an actual date tomorrow. we're going rollerskating! for someone who writes so much fictional romance, i certainly don't get much in real life, but wow! i managed to snag a real date with a real guy i really like!)**

 **anyway, none of those parentheses matter too much, but sometimes i like talking about my personal life, so sue me.**

 **i hope you guys didn't miss me too much and I may or may not see you next friday, but however**

 **have a lovely weekend my friends and happy new year, as well! i almost forgot about that**

 **-Leigh**


	19. Chapter 19

Chapter Nineteen

 _"Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same._ " - _Unknown_

* * *

Annabeth has no idea what Piper was thinking.

Maybe it was Jason's idea, who knows. Sometimes that kid can be as mischievous as Piper, so for all she knows, Jason could be the mastermind behind this- weird scheme.

Okay, for starters, she's not mad. Just confused. Where did they practice this? When did they get the time to- choreograph it? And how the hell did they convince Nico to dance?

Annabeth was standing so beautiful at the end of the aisle, her dress fanned out around her, the bouquet of flowers delicately resting in her arms; she looked like a painted angle in a portrait you'd see on the ceilings of really old churches or libraries in Rome. She was beautiful, and glowing. How every girl should be on her wedding day.

Annabeth's parents weren't there. They weren't even invited. It's not a thing of spite, or resilience. It's just Annabeth not wanting confrontation or bitterness of any kind on her wedding day.

They did email her. How they found out she's getting married is beyond her. (Probably some backstabbing cousin.) It was veg, but described their wishes of love and hope for Annabeth. They didn't say anything about not getting invited, but they did express their disliking with how their sweet daughter is marrying a man they haven't met. Annabeth sent a short, but thankful message back, saying that once they mature enough, she'll be glad to introduce them, but for now she'd kindly like to enjoy her wedding.

So Annabeth asked if Piper would walk her down the aisle.

Piper immediately got both of them drunk with cooking wine and rum cake (which doesn't actually have alcohol in it) and cried like she won a bajillion dollars.

("Oh, my gosh, Annabeth. I get to be your maid of honor and your dad? I've never been so excited for a wedding in my life!"

"Not even your own wedding?"

"Please, Annie, Jason and I signed the documents then went for brunch with you, Percy, and Nico at IHOP. I had a white t-shirt on and Jason cleaned his sneakers, trust me. This will be epic.")

At the time, Annabeth dismissed the "epic" as Piper playing Annabeth's dad while she walks her down the aisle. Not a full dance number.

She's about to take her first step on the white carpet of the church aisle when the thumping of a loud, probably really old, pop song blasts through the speakers. Annabeth almost trips. The piano player looks absolutely scandalized. The crowd is completely unfazed and Piper is skipping down the aisle.

Then everyone is dancing. All Annabeth's bridesmaids take the groomsmen and dance up and down the aisle, the guests in the stands join in and Annabeth finds Percy's eyes from across the aisle. He grins at her and shrugs his shoulders, Annabeth laughs. Piper grabs Annabeth's hands as the song starts to end and the patrons return to their seats, cheeks flushed and broad grins adorning their faces. They were just _waiting_ for that moment.

Annabeth remembers from _L_ _ove, Actually_ , one of her favorite Christmas movies, which Percy refuses to believe is a Christmas movie, how in the beginning, the wedding between the two characters (who can remember names, honestly), there was a huge surprise from the best friend (who was secretly in love with the bride, but that's not important) where a band came up from the crowd and there were singers and a whole beautiful show, just for the two newlyweds. The moment was so sweet and heartwarming because the surprise made the moment even better for the couple.

And Annabeth can't help but shamelessly think that this is so much better than that.

Finally, she's at the end of the aisle and she hand the bouquet to Piper, who kisses her cheek and walks to the bridesmaids. Percy takes Annabeth's hands and butterflies swarm her stomach. Good ones, though. Excited butterflies.

Even though, legally, they're already married, Annabeth feels like it's a breath of fresh air when the priest announces it. They already act like an old married couple and she definitely doesn't need to be married to Percy to know they'll be together forever.

But now she can call him her husband, and he her wife, and they having matching rings and matching smiles. What can beat that, truly.

* * *

Piper doesn't pull anything like before during the reception, but the energy is still the same. After the ceremony, a bunch of old relatives called it a night, because it was already so late, and some couples had kids that had bedtimes, so the reception was visibly smaller than the wedding (but they did that on purpose, because who needs a bunch of tired, screaming kids and old aunts and uncles you barely know, when you can just- not).

Besides, wedding receptions are expensive. The least amount of guests, the better.

(All Percy and Annabeth really need are each other, so no reception would've been fine too.)

They dance together, feeling the beat of the other's heart. Annabeth can't help but notice how handsome he looks in his suit, and she feels so lucky knowing that this sweet man is her husband. Her soulmate.

This morning he left a little note on her wrist. It just said _I can't wait_ but Annabeth knew what it meant and her heart swelled when she saw the letters draw on her arm.

Percy traces the note on her wrist as they sway. "I love you," he tells her. "Even if we weren't soulmates, I'd still love you."

She looks up into his eyes. "I'd love you no matter what world we live in."

He touches his forehead to hers and smiles. Percy whispers, "We're really cheesy."

She breathes out a laugh. "I know, but it's true."

Percy kisses her once, then her forehead, and wraps her in his arms and starts humming along to the song. He's never heard it before, Annabeth's sure, but it has that slow rhythm that's easy to catch on to. She just hugs him tighter and presses her face against his chest, where his heart his and she smiles.

There's nothing she could possibly love more than this man.

* * *

"Piper, you have to understand my- scaredness right now. You dragged me into the women's bathroom, checked if it was empty, and locked the doors."

Piper stops pacing. "Is 'scaredness' even a word?"

Annabeth brushes it off. "I don't think so." Piper keeps pacing. She bites on her nails and Annabeth sees how her hands are shaking. "Piper," Annabeth says softly. "What's going on? I can't have my best friend so anxious on my wedding day." She leans against one of the sinks as Piper paces the length of the bathroom, her heels clinking on the tile every step she takes.

Piper smiles at her shakily. "Yeah. I know, I'm sorry. I shouldn't be worrying you, let's go back to the party, I'm sure Percy is wondering where you are-" Piper moves to unlock the door, but Annabeth moves across the room and places a hand on her arm.

"Piper," Annabeth says, raising an eyebrow. "Percy's fine. It's you I'm worried about. What's wrong?"

Piper opens her arms. Annabeth smiles and wraps Piper in her best hug. Annabeth rests her head on Piper's shoulder and Piper holds her like a lifeline. Piper sighs and buries her head in Annabeth's shoulder. "I'm gonna tell him," she whispers.

Annabeth pauses and backs up to look at Piper's face, still holding her close. "That's amazing!"

Piper smiles wearily, she turns around and starts walking around the bathroom again, she leans against one of the sinks, ringing her hands. "I know, I shouldn't be so anxious because we already have Tommy, but what if Jason doesn't want another kid? Or- or what if Tommy doesn't want a sister? Annabeth-"

"Sister?"

"Oh," Piper says. "I forgot to tell you." She puts her hand on her stomach and smiles, her eyes glassy. "It's a girl."

"Oh my god!" Annabeth runs forward and wraps Piper in a tight hug. "Piper, Jason is going to be so happy." Annabeth leans back and tucks a strand of Piper's hair behind her ear. "I promise." Annabeth smiles. "You're the craziest, most brave person I know." She whispers, "You got this."

Piper smiles. "I got this."

There's a moment where Piper just smiles and Annabeth's so blown away by how far they've both come. Just a few years ago, they were both single chumps living together and now Piper's graduated college and Annabeth wrote a book and they're both married and Piper's pregnant with her second child and it's a girl and-

"I'm naming her Beth." Piper smiles so happily, her face nearly splits. A happy tear falls from her eye. "After my sister."

"Piper-" Annabeth starts.

"No, Annabeth, I knew she'd be named after you the moment I found out she was a girl, don't even start." Piper takes Annabeth's hand and puts it on her stomach. They both grin at each other. "I know you got all married today, but I love you, Annabeth. Maybe it's just my mommy hormones-" Annabeth laughs and a tear traces down her face (how many times has she happy cried today?) "-, but I love you so much and I'm so, so happy for you."

Annabeth wipes Piper's tear away and then her own. "Best friends," she says, taking Piper's hand in her own.

"None of that 'till death do we part' bullshit, you can't get rid of me in the afterlife, Bethy. I'll be with you after eternity, you can count on that."

Annabeth can't even respond because she's smiling so wide. Maybe someone can have two soulmates.

* * *

It came as quite a shock to Percy when Nico volunteered to give a toast. He's never been one to public speak, but after Percy couldn't decide between Nico and Jason for best man, he left them to figure it out. Jason would do the organizing (boring) part of the best man shebang, they'd both stand next to him in the aisle, and Nico would give the best man speech.

Percy wasn't sure if he'd even go through with it, but before they all ate Nico stood with the classic clinking-knife-to-side-of-champagne-glass attention grabber. Percy had his arm around the back of Annabeth's chair, and even though he's known her for the past five years, he hasn't seen her for the past few days, what with the whole 'no seeing your betrothed before the wedding!" deal and of course 'no sleeping in the same bed the night before!' rule. Plus last minute preparations and whatnot means Percy hasn't really been able to hold a conversation with her in awhile. He's stoked to be with her now, though.

Plus, she looks breathtaking. Percy's always known how beautiful she is, but tonight, with the twinkly lights strung above them and the blankets of moonlight shining through the window, Percy wonders how he got so lucky. She's beautiful, she's funny, she's smarter than he'll ever be, and she loves him. He intertwines their fingers under the table.

At their same table, Piper is practically sitting on top of Jason. Annabeth told him how she's pregnant again, so Percy understands the excitement. Looking at Annabeth, he can't wait until it's their turn. He kisses her temple. He'll never love anyone more than this woman.

(Although, Percy's not too sure about Piper being pregnant again. During the first one, Percy had moved into the two girls apartment, and Piper was- well, she had an interesting pregnancy. One that resulted Percy in doing almost everything for her, which should be a sin, really. That's Jason's job, and come on, dude, sure you've got class, but your fiance is pregnant and she _needs_ peach yogurt _right now_ so screw Criminal Law.

Not that Percy wasn't stoked to have a nephew. [If that's what you could call it, Percy doesn't honestly know, Jason's his cousin, but they're like brothers.] But he guesses that the situation was just awkward in general: Piper was going to move out around the same time Percy moved in, but then she got pregnant and had to worry more about the baby than a new apartment. It was a little messy, but Percy got a new best friend out of it, plus Tommy likes Percy more than anyone and who could possibly complain about that?

He digresses.)

Nico stands with his glass in hand, his new engagement ring shining on his finger, his other hand resting on Will's shoulder. (Two months ago both he and Will planned to propose to each other. It was one of those 'Will you marry me?' 'Yes, but will you marry me?' kinda things. Will cried hard, and Nico denies that he did, but he definitely did.)

Everyone raises their glasses. Nico starts. "Five years ago, Percy told me the girl talking to him on his arm was named Annabeth. He said she had blonde hair and grey eyes." He smiles at Percy. "I could've easily told him that the girl down the hall who's rooming with the love of Jason's life is the same girl who played Mythomagic with me on the top of the washing machines and who's also named Annabeth, has blonde hair and grey eyes, but where's the fun in that." Everyone laughs. "Eventually they found each other, like all soulmates do. And I can't say I'm particularly a genius in romance, but these guys are indefinitely, madly, grossly, in love. It's cute now, but it wasn't when it was on my living room floor at three in the afternoon." There's a few surprised laughs and Piper bursts out laughing, throwing her head back.

"That never happened!" Percy exclaims.

"Yes, it did," Nico says, matter-of-factly. "And it was disgusting and I'll never forgive you for it, but what's a best man's speech without an embarrassing story or two?" Percy just smiles and shakes his head. Annabeth laughs next to him, putting her head on his shoulder. "Okay, now for the sad part," Nico says, taking a drink of his champagne. "This wedding is so beautiful and Annabeth, you did a wonderful job-" someone clears their throat "-you too, Piper. The lights are magnificent."

Everyone chuckles and Piper scoffs. "I did more than the lights, you prick."

Nico smiles and starts talking again, his voice more serious. He looks down at the table while he talks. "Aunt Sally would've been so happy to see this." Percy's chest tightens, and Annabeth squeezes his arm. "Wherever she is, she's cheering you guys on, and she's so proud of you both." Nico smiles and looks back up to Percy and Annabeth. "From Sally and from me, to Annabeth and Percy, cheers!"

"Cheers!" Everyone chorused. Percy raises his glass and drinks the rest of it. He looks over Annabeth's head out of the window for a moment, thinking that wherever his mom is, she's definitely happy for him. His heart swells. He kisses Annabeth's forehead and rests his head on top of hers. Around the room, some couples have gotten up to dance again. Piper and Jason are whispering softly and Jason's hand is resting on Piper's stomach, she laughs at something he's said. Nico and Will are standing to dance and Nico twirls Will, who laughs and leans to kiss his fiance's cheek.

Percy looks down at Annabeth. She's half asleep on his shoulder, he chuckles and kisses her head again. He rubs his fingers over the note he left. _I can't wait_ , it says. This morning it meant he couldn't wait to get married. But now it means that he can't wait for the rest of his life with his soulmate by his side. He can't wait for their own house, their own yard, their own kids, their own life. Just the two of them. Forever.

Annabeth blinks sleepily and looks up at him. She smiles. "Husband," she says.

"Wife," he says.

What a perfect day.

What a perfect end.

* * *

 **hello hello there**

 **oh my god its over holy guacamole. im sure that's not how you spell it but whatever**

 **i absolutely loved how i ended this**

 **let me tell you guys, im not at school today so i sat down and wrote this for two hours with only the sound of my dogs snores to keep me going.**

 **wow. my Author Brain is surely at it again. before i really get into my sappy goodbyes, let me dedicate this to a few lovely people**

 **firstly, Orange Pens and Messy Hands (he's another writer on this site, please go check out his stories, they're magnificent). thank you for listening (reading?) to my ramblings about the oddest things. we bonded over writing but that turned into illegal daycare and your broken hand (rip in peace), having another friend on this site inspired me to get my self in gear and write this freaking chapter, so thank you for talking to me and being super cool my friend**

 **Helen of Troy, we used to pm all the time, girl! we need to catch up! you definitely helped inspire me to write out a few chapters along the way, and you always have the sweetest reviews, so thank you for being fantastic**

 **(for whatever reason, isn't allowing me to write your username, probably because it thinks it's a url, but whatever) suicidal stolen art, i know we haven't talked too much, but you've always been super sweet when we do and your reviews always bring a huge smile to my face, so absolutely thank you for being epic**

 **and OF COURSE, my main queen GirlishlyGreek. gosh you've been writing me essays for reviews since Sixth Period Study Hall, goooodness. you have no idea how excited i get when i see you've reviewed. i smile so much and you always make me laugh, we've got to talk more girl! pm me anytime, im always up to chat with anyone lol. im your number one fan and i'll always be. thank you for leaving me the sweetest reviews to read, they always brighten my day.**

 **Also: to everyone who has pmed me being concerned about my (very long) hiatus, thank you. those little words of motivation have gotten me to write down little notes about what to add into this chapter. thank you for letting me know how much you love the story and helping me figure this thing out, you're wonderful**

 **and finally: the readers!1 you people are fantabulous and i could not have done this without you. there were a few moments where i had doubts and thought of ending this story without finishing it, but you guys have motivated me to write the last few thousand words of this long story that is officially one year in the making! i started this story last january! and now its technically february! (holy crap i just realized im uploading on a friday, look at me go) and a huge thank you to those who kept reviewing even though i hadn't uploaded in a while, you people helped me want to finish this story.**

 ***drum roll please***

 **!**

 **this story, as of when im writing this authors note, has 295 reviews and 51,000-ish views! holy crap! the stats! wow! you guys are so wonderful and im running out of adjectives to use, but you get the point, thank you for loving this story just as much as i do.**

 **ugh, this is making me emotional bleh.**

 **(fun fact: i had an idea to add into this chapter, but i couldn't really find a good place to put it, but i was gonna write a scene where they cut the wedding cake and obviously they smush it all over each others faces and then they do the "im covered in cake and so are you" kiss where they just get even more covered in cake. so just imagine that one my sweet readers)**

 **(also the wedding dance scene was from the office [my favorite tv show] if you want to see what that scene is supposed to look like, go on youtube and search "jim and pams wedding" and it should come up. piper is micheal scott there is no changing my mind)**

 **ugh im playing this out because i don't want this to end. i just dont want to say goodbye to these characters.**

 **all good things must come to an end though.**

 **so this is goodbye then. thank you for everything, you beautiful readers.**

 **for the last time (until my next story, that is), have an amazing friday and a wonderful rest of your weekend**

 **-Leigh**


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